Stones Best Left Unturned
by Heidi Ahlmen
Summary: Alerted by a close friend to the possibility of the existence an artifact that perhaps should stay hidden from humanity, Lara is forced to join a team of young scientists en route to a discovery that could shed light on the origins of civilization and the
1. Disclaimer & Prologue

Lara Croft Tomb Raider: Legend (C) Eidos Interactive Limited, 2005. Developed by Crystal Dynamics, Inc. Published by Eidos, Inc. 2005. Lara Croft Tomb Raider: Legend, Lara Croft, Tomb Raider, the Tomb Raider logo, Eidos and the Eidos logo, Crystal Dynamics and the Crystal Dynamics logo are all trademarks of the Eidos Group of Companies. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. All rights reserved.

**Not to be archived anywhere outside the Croft Codex, and Raider: **

**Stones Best Left Unturned**

By Heidi Ahlmen

Note: a nice map of the area where this story takes place can be found at

is the study of whatever religious or heroic legends are so foreign to a student's experience that he cannot believe them to be true."

- Robert Graves 1968

**Prologue:A difficult patient**

Eric Falshingham grimaced at the foul smell of disinfectant that floated relentlessly in the corridor he was pacing down. After dodging a few nurses along with a technician transporting a broken gurney towards the elevators he halted before the ward's reception desk. The receptionist was so engrossed in her papers she failed to notice him until he cleared his throat, then she raised her head just as a phone began to ring in a demanding crescendo.

Falshingham cleared his throat and the woman raised her head just as a phone began to ring in a demanding crescendo. "Pardon," she commented dryly, and picked up the receiver.

Falshingham sighed. His face must've looked quite exasperated as the woman paused her conversation, covered the receiver with her palm and shot him a cold, interrogative look. "Yes?"

"Lara Croft, please?"

The woman stared at him. Literally stared. Then she found her composure, and pointed her finger towards the end of the corridor. "Number sixty-three."

Falshingham smiled. "Thank you," he replied, quickly surveyed the ghastly yellow bouquet of flowers he was carrying, and continued down the corridor.

It turned out that number sixty-three wasn't difficult to find. When he'd passed number sixty an enraged shriek and a chair flying out of a room with the door open caught his attention. He was nearly knocked down by a male nurse trailing backwards out of the room in a haste escape.

Falshingham smiled. Now he wouldn't even have to check the room number. He walked in.

Lara Croft, lying in the only bed in the room wearing a set of black, silky pajamas, pushed herself to a sitting position and prepared for another bout of verbal abuse before she recognized her visitor. "Falshingham!"

She had known him for a long time and could with honesty say that he was one of the more peculiar characters she had ever met. His hobbies went deeper into magic and sorcery than Lara sometimes felt comfortable with, but he did have considerable skill and knowledge when it came to the occult and Lara considered him a valuable consort and a good friend. However, she had not yet found a suitable word to describe his profession, as "wizard" was such a prejudiced one, something Falshingham himself had once commented.

He grabbed an upturned chair and dragged it next to Lara's bed after giving her a polite kiss on the cheek. "Lara. You've certainly got your energies back. How was Karachi?"

She'd just returned from a hunt in Pakistan, injured, and having once cared for her when she was ill Falshingham could well imagine the suffering Lara was putting the staff through. She was a notoriously bad patient who got very acutely irritated when denied her exercise even due to sound reasons.

"Eventful, as you can imagine," Lara retorted.

Falshingham snagged her chart from the bedside table and began reading.

A nurse peeked in. Lara grimaced. "Bloody gits. Won't even let me walk around. They're probably afraid I'd take a runner. Not that I haven't tried."

"That's my girl – giving them a run for their money. Severe concussion, then? With a fractured skull? What have you been up to? Bungee without a rope?"

Lara smiled sadly. "Just a little something that involved an outdated rope and a loose rock. Bloody McCreegan got on my trail again and decided it was time for an exchange of property."

Suddenly Fashingham's expression was full of concern. "This situation might be a problem."

Lara's expression melted into apology. "Don't worry – they're not kicking me out yet, I just had a slight disagreement with the damned nurse over my alleged tendency of fainting in the shower."

"That wasn't what I meant." The concern did not subside.

Lara pushed a woolly shawl off the bed and turned to face him properly. "I'll be as good as new in a week or so. Don't you worry."

Falshingham glanced at both his watch and the wall clock. Lara had rarely seen him so seemingly riled up. "It's just that we might not have that much time." He commented, rising from the chair.

"What are you on about, Falshingham?"

He shot her a nervous glance. "I have to go. Could you please promise me something?"

"What is it?" Lara dangled her leg over the edge of the bed.

"Just promise." Falshingham's tone was serious.

Lara shot him an indignant look. "You know I don't work like that. Spill."

"Come and see me when they let you out, alright? It's important. Don't take permanent residence here."

Lara laughed hollowly. "When has that been a desire of mine? I'll come over, I give you my word."

Falshingham started for the door. In Lara's opinion he looked disturbingly distraught, as though the fact that they were not releasing her yet had somehow upset him. She would certainly visit him soon to get to the bottom of this.

When he was almost at the door he remembered the flowers her was still clutching. He turned and tossed the bouquet to Lara. "For you."

Lara caught the ghastly yellow flowers, uncertain what to make of the gesture. "Thank you," she replied, but he was already out of the door.


	2. Chapter 1 Things best left buried?

Chapter IThings best left buried? 

A week later Lara chimed the melodical doorbell of the Falshingham residence. She was glad to get out of the bitter wind which was chilling her to the bone despite the fact that she wore her thickest woolly coat. She cursed her decision to take the bike instead of the Range Rover.

An impeccably neatly dressed maid opened the heavy double doors. "Yes?"

"Lady Lara Croft to see Mr Falshingham. Just tell him Lara's here – he's been expecting me."

The maid let her into the foyer and left the scene. After a few minutes Falshingham himself appeared. "Lara! At the eleventh hour! Please, let me take your coat."

Lara passed him her coat and he placed it neatly on a foyer chair. "New maid, I see? I guess the last one finally decided that normal, sane chaps don't feature medieval torture paraphernalia in their living rooms."

Falshingham laughed. "Maria went back to Chile; her youngest is graduating from university and she wanted to be there. And you know me, I can't handle more than a week of cooking my own omelettes."

Lara smiled back, expecting to be escorted down to the dungeons, but instead Falshingham indicated that they should move to his library. The maid brought a tray of tea and left the room, closing the doors tightly behind her, as she had obviously been instructed to.

Lara sipped her tea. "I have a strange feeling I'm being locked in," she joked mildly, but Falshingham did not smile so she continued, "Now, will you please indulge me as to this urgent matter that obviously is stealing both your time and energy," she half-demanded, noticing the dark shadows under Falshingham's eyes. He was as pale as usual – as pale as anyone who spent the majority of their time indoors in front of the screen or nose buried in books and manuscripts.

Falshingham was very different from the usual academics. With skill and a profound interest in the occult, ancient cultures and religion, he had often provided Lara with strange yet accurate clues when her commissions or personal affairs had demanded an unorthodox approach. He might seem like a mad professor at first, but Lara trusted him – he'd never been wrong before.

In addition to his other traits Falshingham was usually a very sociable person with a good sense of humour. Now he seemed to be torn in several directions.

"Lara, are you familiar with a scholar named Erich von Daeniken?

Lara thought for a second. "Isn't he that self-acclaimed archaeologist who founded the 'ancient astronaut' theory?"

Falshingham smiled for the first time. "So you are familiar with his works. Good, good."

"I wouldn't use the word 'familiar' here. I've only heard of him and met him once – he's considered a bit of an inside joke in archaeology circles. He has quite an amount of ill-interpreted evidence which is substantial at best, blatant lies and misconduct at worst."

"Unlike you to be this sceptical," Falshingham commented, "You did tell me about your experiences at Area 51..."

"That was different," Lara retorted. "So, what's gotten you so worked up about this man?"

Falshingham produced a book from a nearby table and after pulling out some photocopies from between the pages he passed the papers to Lara. She leafed through the images. Mainly reliefs or other religious images photographed from temple or pyramid walls. The style was easy to recognize. "I'd say these are from either Chichen Itza or Uxmal or some other Mayan settlement in the Yucatan peninsula."

"Very good. These are from Uxmal and Tulum, but similar designs have been discovered throughout the Mayan settlements in Southern Mexico and Yucatan."

All the carvings featured the same image – a human-looking creature inside a rectangle which seemed to include strange, machine-like shapes. He wore a helmet and what seemed like a breathing apparatus. The style of the headpiece varied slightly in the images, but they were strikingly similar. "One of Daeniken's astronauts, I presume?" Lara asked.

Falshingham cleared his throat, seemingly preparing for one of his often lengthy speeches. "As you probably know, Daeniken claims that ancient high cultures did not evolve on their own, but received help from extraterrestrials, who where mistaken for gods and depicted as such in the religious imagery. An understandable perception – the visitors possessed such technology which was beyond the understanding of the people to whom they appeared. Many cultures and historical sources – even the Bible – contain stories of gods who traveled on fire wagons that created an awesome noise, gods who acted very impulsively compared to the usual, perfect image of a true god."

Lara put the pictures away. All right, they were strange, but she wasn't buying the story easily. She had to wonder why Falshingham could be fascinated by such a marginal theory. True, archaeology was full of unfilled gaps in knowledge, mysteries and incoherent sources, but it had been humans who had written their own history, and humans made mistakes. Period. Such mistakes and misunderstandings that cumulated in later history texts and evolved into bigger errors did not require the presence of aliens.

"Daeniken has done well to raise the question of whether archaeologists too easily label strange cultural icons as imaginary gods."

Lara sighed. "There are many cultures whose gods have taken amusing forms. Take Egypt. And only a fraction of those are on Daeniken's list of alien messiahs."

Falshingham grinned. "So you have studied his works after all."

Lara shrugged. "They made for a good April Fool's day bedtime reading, that's all. Plus I once participated in a symposium where he spoke. The man bluntly and falsely attacked my published papers on Incan burial culture. He's a hoax and I can't see why I have any reason to believe-- "

Before Lara could continue her rant Falshingham interrupted. "Ultimately this isn't about him or you, Lara. His fantastic theories on the origins of these beliefs and artifacts aside, he has made some interesting and perhaps even dangerous connections. Some things are buried for a reason as I suspect you are aware."

Lara nodded.

"Besides, Daeniken is not the only one who has questioned the origin of these images. I only brought him up as someone whose works you might know. Daeniken has, however, written more extensively on the subject than anyone. Luckily for us and the rest of the world, he made one grave mistake."

"The aliens?"

Falshingham stole a glance at the door, as though he was worried someone might hear him, then nodded and smiled. "Not quite. The mistake that he made was that all substantial evidence concerning these visitations were lost."

Lara looked incredulous. "You're saying?"

Falshingham picked up one of the photocopies Lara had been looking at and pointed at the helmet. "It is a common feature of the folklore concerning gods who came from the stars that they often left machines and other technical aids to the people they had favored. And it is not the only explanation of such mastery of physics and chemistry that only has been known to evolve during the three past centuries. Perhaps there were, indeed, higher beings at work, aiding these cultures, perhaps Daeniken's little green men."

Lara looked ever so slightly more intrigued. "I suppose, then, that you are claiming that there exists some sort of a ufology holy grail somewhere?"

Falshingham's expression was honest and serious. "I would not go to anyone else with such concerns, Lara. With your… unusual experience within the area I trust you to not trifle with such matters."

"You do sound unusually serious. Worry not, whatever it is you might say will be treated with the same face value as anything you have told me."

Falshingham smirked. "And what level of value might that be then?"

Lara laughed. "So I'm guessing this is about an artifact of unknown origin you would like me to recover?" This seemed straightforward enough but what still evaded her was the reason why Falshingham might've been so personally invested in the subject.

Falshingham's face was more serious than ever. "Quite the opposite, Lara. This is about an artifact, but not about one you should recover. I'm speaking of an artifact you must make sure no one – not even yourself – discovers or uses."

"The helmet you see in the pictures – I am not taking any stance as to its origin, but I would like to stress the importance of it in many Mayan stories. It was given to an early Mayan king by a god. The visitors told him it enabled its bearer to read the thoughts of others – allegedly also the thoughts and impressions of animals. It was never used – the rumours of a formidable godly weapon was enough to keep other tribes at bay. The city-state thrived and grew, eventually becoming Uxmal. It survived until the arrival of the conquistadors."

"Sounds like quite the magic wand for a successful empire," Lara commented, "But Uxmal is in ruins and its people perished."

Falshingham seemed content at her background knowledge. "You are quire right. The last king of Uxmal did not use the helmet to his people's good like his predecessors did – they used it as just a fear factor. The last king decided to wear it. It instantly drove him mad, bringing forth his most unadmirable traits, making him a monster amidst men. His eventual downfall was the result of a joint effort by the mutinous citizens and attacking tribes who became too afraid of him to let things be – no human could have destroyed him alone. His downfall marked the destruction of the city-state as well. The helmet was hidden or destroyed by the priesthood. No sign of its resting place remained – until a year ago. How is your head, by the way?"

Lara shook out of her reverie of thoughts. "I'm quite alright, thank you. The headaches are surprisingly persistent, but I've been given green light to begin my usual routine training in a few days."

"Head injuries, particularly the kind you suffered usually pose a risk of epileptic seizures, loss of consciousness or stroke long afterwards. Is this the case with you?"

"I did lose consciousness for more than three minutes, but the trauma was not serious. Nothing has happened since. I'm fine, Falshingham. Why all this inquiry of unlikely odds?"

"I'll come to that in a second."

"So," Lara shifted in her chair, "What happened a year ago?"

"I have a friend in Cambridge – he holds the chair in cultural anthropology. His son is an archaeologist, recently graduated so you probably wouldn't recognize the name. He has been working in Mexico on his own with a former ladyfriend and has several contacts there. One of them told him of a discovery on the Yucatan coast near the Island of Cozumel. In short, it was a set of ceremonial carvings made in haste that speak of this helmet. They indicate that in order to protect the world from the helmet it was thrown in a _cenote_."

Cenotes were an archaeological and geological specialty of the Yucatan peninsula. They had been formed when a meteorite had hit the nearby waters about the time the dinosaurs had become extinct. They were hidden wells that began from the bottom of the ocean near the coast, spurting warm water from deep below ground during high tide and creating a powerful pull to the depths during lowtide. They had not been studied extensively due to the restraints of diving technology. Only the development during the last ten years has permitted entering these watery furnaces. The Mayans had used them as sacrificial wells – tossing live victims down the holes. Cenotes usually consisted of both flooded passages and air-filled, large caves with rocky shores.

Lara licked her lips. "A more logical choice that it might seem. The Maya did perceive the cenotes to be gates into the underworld of gods and spirits. Anything tossed down into one would not stay in this world and the gods would know better what to do with such a trinket."

"This young man is preparing for an expedition. He has already gathered a team and is flying to Cancun in three days. He must be stopped."

Lara raised her hands in objection. "Halt here, Falshingham. What harm would it bring if he does discover this artifact? It sounds like a wonderful discovery, one that would rewrite history."

"That shows that you have not had as much time to think about this as I have."

Lara raised her chin, looking indignant.

Falshingham explained. "Yes, a wonderful discovery. There would be many who would love to claim it – the means to ultimate domination."

Lara looked doubtful. "It's just a relic. I have yet to see more than just a few relics that would actually hold much mystical power."

"I have not yet disclosed why it holds such an awesome power and what my theory truly is." Falshingham leaned on a heavy armchair, staring intently at Lara. "Daeniken thought these people had misinterpreted aliens as gods. If this is true we're talking about a culture ahead of humans perhaps millions of years, wielding technology that would require not only the evolution of philosophy and science, but also the evolution of the people. I seriously doubt that we humans would be ready for that. We only know how to make use of instruments of war, not peace – and peace may be the only use for this artifact. Consider Hitler – he sought many legendary Christian relics because he wanted to use them as a sort of a spiritual weapon. Ironically, the primitive tribes of ancient days may have been more prepared to use this sort of power sensibly. Politics have evolved beyond those days into a more aggressive powerplay. Just look at what the Da Vinci Code did."

He leaned back into his seat and continued, "This artifact might even be used to call upon the ancient gods, to make some sort of a contact. True appreciation of the helmet's power lies in accepting the possibility of supreme powers – a belief that those who would most like to have this helmet to themselves usually do not hold. Evidence of aliens would throw the world into chaos."

Lara nodded silently. She had nothing against proving the existence of extraterrestrial life, it would certainly shift some power axes and change the world, but a battle over the dominance of such a godlike artifact could not be a healthy idea. With the things she had seen and experienced she could not dismiss this, not even if she very much wished to.

Lara crossed her arms. "As you probably know, stories like this are often hoaxes. It is unlikely that the helmet holds any mystical powers. And I'm not even going to get started on the 'made by aliens' part."

Falshingham shot her a glance. "Can we afford the risk that the helmet is authentically extraterrestrial?"

Lara did not feel she needed to reply. Falshingham was right. The whole idea of an ancient astronaut headgear sounded ridiculous at best, but the risk that there was a grain of truth behind it was a risk too big to take.

She decided to change the subject, feeling a headache coming on from all the politics. "How do you suggest I stop this chap then? A lucky shot through a hotel window?"

Falshingham grimaced. "So like you to even joke about such a possibility."

"I detest that characterization."

"If you did dispose of him, there would still be the other members of his team. It is not certain that they know the full story of what is being searched for here. No, I bid you not to cause him any harm. Instead you will be joining the expedition."

"What? As though they would want me on the scene! They'd invariably think I was there to steal their glory. You said he has gathered a team. When a team is ready it is unlikely they might want to open the door for one more person. Why can't I just shadow them around and snag the helmet?"

"Would you be able to not use it?"

Lara swallowed. Excellent question. What the artifact promised was power beyond any ordinary human abilities. Lara had become too self-aware, too hardened and unidealistic to think that she wouldn't have the same temptation to try it just once like anyone else.

"You will join the expedition and make sure that the artifact stays hidden. I have already arranged it. You will need these people to fend off yourself, Lara."

Lara raised her brows. "And how did you pull that stunt, then, getting me on the team?"

Falshingham tapped his forehead. "Just a couple of them have done spelunking, and as far as I know only the leader Brian Pearsall is skilled enough to actually dive down a cenote. Two of them are otherwise experienced divers, though. They were desperately looking for a cave diving expert to guide them through the subtleties of underwater spelunking. That is where you enter the picture. I recommended you through my colleague. A plane ticket has been booked for you for the seventeenth. You will arrive a day after the team and meet them in Cancun. This delay won't be a problem – they'll have to spend time hiring a boat and gathering all necessary gear. As a diving safety specialist you could pull the necessary strings to ensure they keep out of 'too hazardous' areas, that is to say, areas where the helmet might be found."

"That's supposing I'll know where it is. True, I'll have to be the lead diver and thus I would survey every location first. They'll still think I'm there to steal their spotlight."

"I told them you were fed up with archaeology and just wanted a sport holiday."

"You _what_? Falshingham, sometimes you just--" Lara's eyes flashed.

He just smiled, relieved for the first time in a month after Lara's reluctant but promising-sounding comments. He knew she'd go. "I know. That is why I have been concerned with your past injury – isn't that a contraindication for diving?"

Lara nodded grimly. "I'll survive."

After an hour of briefing on the subject with Lara asking questions and Falshingham replying as best as he could about the site, about the team members and even Daeniken's theories, Lara left.

Falshingham lingered in the doorway, watching her drive off and hoping he was not sending her to death. Or something infinitely worse.


	3. Chapter 2 First Impressions

**Chapter II First impressions**

Lara awoke to the flapping of the white cotton drapes. She was drenched with sweat, having slept only lightly, tossing and turning through the hot Mexican night. Cancun was a narrow cape in the middle of the brilliantly turquoise coast but the sea winds only had a marginal cooling effect due to the hot inland winds coming in from the Yucatan peninsula. Filled with luxury hotels and topless beaches it was quite far down on Lara's list of favorite places, but the atmosphere was laid-back and the service good.

She'd arrived late the previous evening and decided that meeting the team so late would not have provided the best of opportunities for a neutral introduction. She needed some sleep and decided to treat herself to one night of luxury before she'd have to spend god knows how long camping. Field teams usually never had the funds to provide really comfortable lodging and the cenotes they were looking for were far from tourist trails and luxury villas.

She'd called the team leader before catching her flight in London. Falshingham had been adamant in advising Lara to act as neutrally and uninterested in the artifact as possible. Falshingham had claimed to Pearsall that Lara didn't even know what they were looking for and didn't care. Lara had gritted her teeth and this revelation; faking lack of interest and gathering information would without doubt prove a difficult combination. Falshingham was excellent at what he did but for stealth work he had no experience. The setup wasn't the best possible one but Lara had no choice – she would have to stick with the story. What made her the most concerned was Falshingham's fabrication that she wanted to take a break from archaeology. To anyone who had the slightest idea who she was it would sound preposterous so Lara just had to hope that the team member's weren't too keen followers on professional gossip, the subject of which Lara was frequently.

She dragged herself up, feeling surprisingly fatigued and pulled on the outfit she'd carefully selected the previous evening before inking into a long bath: a long linen skirt with her trademark blue sleeveless top. Her guns were safely tucked into her suitcase all but for one, safely and inconspicuously strapped onto her calf.

She hailed a taxi after checking out and leaned into the hot leather seat as the waking streets of Cancun swirled past. The small stalls selling snacks, roller-skating local kids and American tourists sampling made-in-china Inca ponchos were such a long way from the Mexico Lara knew best – that of jungle sounds, ancient temples, sacrificial mounds and buried treasure inside grey rock.

She'd gotten instructions to meet the team for morning coffee at a resort in the far end of the cape near the docks. The pink and brown building was a low hacienda with a large open terrace. The restaurant side was packed with people and waiters carrying colourful drinks, and Lara braced herself for a long hike around the tables looking for the group but in the end it was Brian who found her. He held his hand up and another man next to him was waving almost frantically.

Lara made her way to the seaside terrace where they were waiting, and slowed her pace to get a good look at the motley group. There were six of them; three men and two women.

Brian, the leader, looked the part. A young, fit man in his late twenties, slightly sunburnt – probably the reason for his brand new-looking panama hat. He had a strong jaw, inquisitive eyes and quite a strong presence. Next to him sat a well-dressed, thin woman also in her late twenties. She had long, impeccably slick hair which she kept open, a Mediterranean complexion and dark, stylish sunglasses. She was looking out to sea, her posture seeming somewhat bored.

The man sitting next to Brian, a flannel-shirted guy with tousled hair and surprisingly expensive-looking shoes which really didn't fit the rest of his fashion choices – stood up and shook Lara's hand. "Noah," he commented, smiling widely.

Lara nodded and slid into the chair Noah flipped out from somewhere. He seemed nervous, almost agitated and was staring at Lara expectantly.

Brian leaned forward and shook her hand. "Lara Croft. Pleased to meet you. Noah's been filling us up on your travels," Brian added carefully.

Noah nodded, still smiling as though his mouth was permanently stuck in the position. Lara sighed inwardly – no chance of acting incognito. It was obvious Noah was a fan, and Lara guessed he could be a potential nuisance. "Perhaps someone could fill me up on yours as well," she offered politely.

Brian did not reply. Instead, he gently dropped his palms on the Italian-looking woman's shoulders. "This is Arie."

Lara shook her hand and Arie – or Aricia Licari, as she corrected – took off her sunglasses, smiling vaguely. "I've read your paper on Vilcabamba, I think." She commented dryly, giving no hints as to whether she'd appreciated the paper or not.

"Pardon for asking, but are you one of the Naples' Licaris?" The Licaris were a well-known shipowners and business tycoon from Northern Italy, and Lara was almost certain she'd sometime taken a commission from one of the major players in their family enterprise.

Aricia nodded. "Brian and I met in Paris when he was there as an exchange student." She shot a strange look at Pearsall.

"So you two are…" Lara begun to ask, but Brian quickly replied no, and left it at that, changing the subject. "Arie will be doing some diving, but mostly handling above water support with Connie and Noah, who's our tech specialist. Arie majored in marine archaeology and Noah just graduated from CalTech."

Brian himself was a Chicago archaeology major, just like Lara had been. They'd discussed this as part of their overly polite chitchat over the phone.

"And this is Ben; Benjamin Elder, that is." Brian nodded to Aricia's left and a bearded man looking to be in his early thirties nodded to her. Lara soon realized he couldn't be any older than Brian.

"We went to high school together. Ben knows everything there is to know about the helmet." Brian lowered his voice considerably during the last word.

Ben looked uninterested distraught even. Dreamy, almost. He had a disheveled look and a vacant smile and Lara couldn't quite put a finger on what made him look so strange. Ben did not say a word, just continued his silent reverie.

An outdoorsy-looking South American woman seated at the end of the table was obviously patiently waiting to be introduced.

"And you are?" Lara asked, extending her hand. The woman grabbed it briefly with both hands, raising herself from the seat. She had a warm smile and a relaxed look.

"Conchita Adams," she said, smiling and shaking Lara's hand.

"Pleased to meet you."

Brian leaned back into his seat and Lara sat back into her allocated chair. "Conchita's our cenote specialist. She's from Colombia and majored in anthropology there."

Lara nodded. Soon a waiter appeared with a reddish drink that was placed before her. Noticing her confusion Brian commented, "We took the liberty of ordering. Welcome to the team."

Lara sipped her drink. It was quite sugary for her taste, she preferred a good, sound single-malt over these tourist concoctions. "Thank you." She did not like being ordered to and she guessed that for Brian this could even be some sort of a power thing. "So when shall we be leaving for the Boca Paila?"

Boca Paila was an area famous for its cenotes near Uxmal, a capital for diving buffs. Boca Paila was a bit too far from Uxmal for regular tourists to wander and the cenotes they were looking for were not along the coastline but near the ruined city of Muyil. The jungle around it was mostly inaccessible mangrove bush so they'd have to take a boat up the Acaira river to reach the cenotes.

Brian flashed a smile that was not warm, only bland. "I see you've done your diving homework. The ship's docked in El Rey and ready to go in a couple of hours. Julian didn't want to pay the high fees here, plus there was a cliff there he wanted to try so we left him there," Brian joked and the rest of the group looked amused, all but Aricia who seemed to prefer keeping her cool.

They packed into two banged-up jeeps, Lara stuck in the narrow space between Noah and Benjamin in the backseat while Brian enjoyed the luxury of the wide front seat. Aricia had decided to join Conchita in the other car and Lara wished she'd done the same.

Noah's leg kept brushing against hers in the tight confines and he seemed to be quite aware of it, looking apologetic and making a visible gesture of leaning away. Ben, on the other hand sat almost leaning onto her but didn't even seem to notice anyone else was there at all.

Lara turned to face him. Time to start the misleading. "So, we're looking for some sort of an armour piece, right?"

Ben was shaken out of his train of thoughts and looked almost indignant. "Not really, it's more like a religious artifact. It was used to call upon gods, gods which probably weren't as supernatural as archaeologists think."

This spike seemed to be directed at Lara. She decided to take it. "So where is it from then? You're not one of those ancient astronaut believers, are you?"

Benjamin looked irritated. "It doesn't sound like Lara Croft to dismiss substantial evidence with just a shrug. At least if you believe Noah."

Noah seemed thrilled at the mention of his name.

Lara, however, did not wish to take the argument any further. "The press often likes to exaggerate."

Noah looked disappointed. "But you did hunt down a Yeti?"

Lara answered with an inquisitive look.

"And you were in Egypt when all that strange stuff was happening, right?"

Lara stared out of the window.

Noah leaned over her towards Benjamin. "She's been to Area 51."

Benjamin shot him a look. "Area 51's a hoax, you know."

Lara sighed silently. This was going to be a long ride.

After unpacking everything from the jeeps, they began carrying the gear towards the docks. The sunlight was blinding, and Lara gladly accepted Conchita's kind offer to borrow her spare peaked cap. Hauling the diving tanks around was no walk in the park, and it was obvious the other two women were struggling with the chore. Lara flung hers onto her back and used her arms to help support the heavy tanks dragged by Aricia. She flashed a quick, polite smile and stopped to pull off the tight-fitting sweater she was wearing. "You're going to get sunburned," Conchita warned, and Aricia did not reply. Instead she let the tanks flop onto the dock and, shading her eyes with her palm, waited for Brian to reach them with his load. He stopped as well, and the two of them seemed to share quite a heated conversation. In the end Aricia left half of her load onto the dock and hauled the rest into the boat.

The boat was sturdy-looking with a steel hull and wooden paneling and had surprisingly spacious cabinets inside. Aricia shared with Brian even though there seemed to be quite a cool breeze flowing between the two of them. Ben and Noah shared a compartment with two bunk beds hanging from the ceiling and Conchita was staying in the small cabin next to theirs. Lara got a cabinet higher up, next to one with a locked door and the handpainted word 'captain' on it. The occupant of that cabin was, however, still out of sight.

Brian had commented that their captain was quite a character but in which way, he had not specified. Lara was looking forward to meeting him, perhaps he might provide more pleasant company than most of the team. Conchita seemed quite nice and level-headed but apart from this Lara was suspicious. Brian's outgoing exterior was most likely a front to quite an ambitious and ruthless guy – Lara had met many similar types and even though she usually got along great with people characters like Brian always kept her on her toes. It seemed that Brian held this wary curiosity towards her that was unnerving.

Aricia, on the other hand, obviously had no interest in getting to know Lara. It seemed there was more going on between her and Brian than met the eye. His brisk denial of their involvement probably meant that Lara's question had ventured into areas they themselves did not like delving into.

Noah was exhausting and Benjamin puzzling. Neither of them, in Lara's eyes, posed a threat concerning the discovery of the helmet. The two people she would have to keep an eye on were without doubt Aricia and Brian.

El Rey was just a small fishing village, and after settling into the boat Noah suggested looking for a restaurant, 'since it was gonna be the last decent meal they would be getting for a long time'.

Lara was far from hungry and actually felt slightly beaten and dizzy by the sunlight. She decided it wasn't going to be too suspicious if she went her separate ways for a while, so she suggested she could stretch her legs a bit by going to find Julian.

Brian agreed and and gave her a set of car keys, "That's for Julian's jeep. He left this morning with some friend of his for Xcaret to find some cliff his buddy had been on about for weeks. You'll find the road easily, just ask any local."

"So he's a climber then?"

Brian nodded. "Just one of his oddities, I guess."

Lara nodded and took the keys. Perhaps she could get along with this Julian chap. She headed back to the boat to change her clothes into a more practical set.


	4. Chapter 3 Julian

**Chapter III Julian**

Lara allowed her toes to lean on the gas once again, and she dragged the lower rubber band holding her braid off to let her hair flow more freely in the dry wind. She'd left El Rey behind a while ago and was now speeding along an uneven country road perhaps a tad faster than was reasonable, but she didn't care. Socializing with strangers had never been her forte. She had made her decision after realizing this was probably her last chance to spend some time on her own before packing into a boat with seven other people for weeks.

The cliff she was looking for had no name, but the locals she had stopped to ask knew it – more and more tourists, it seemed, were flocking outside the coastal towns, tempted by cenote diving and good climbing. Lara had a tendency to look down on Mexican climbing – the rock was usually so eroded by trees and plantation that the more difficult routes posed considerable risks for falling when using trad gear, and the easier routes naturally held no interest for her.

After taking two lefts from the main road and slowing down to admire a nearby waterfall, Lara found the old mining road a group of locals had sworn lead to the cliff. Lara was glad she was driving a 4-wheel drive when the old road began winding and getting steeper. Ravines dropped down hundreds of meters nearby, trees grew from what seemed like vertical cliffs and the view down to nearby valleys was quite formidable. Lara sped over the more slippery parts of the road and carefully maneuvered uphill where the roadside had eroded away. After a good half-an hour drive with some hairpin turns the road ended and Lara was forced to continue on foot.

A vertical rock face was partly visible through some nearby jacaranda trees and without any better guesses Lara headed through the thick undergrowth towards the grey wall looming ahead.

She decided it had to be the right one and had to admit it was quite a sight. Her assessment was further supported by the fact that there were two ropebags, several racks of trad gear and some spare harnesses in addition to a couple of water bottles lying on a slate of basalt nearby. Two ropes were fixed to the rock wall with camalots, hexes and higher up, very small stoppers.

Lara gazed up the wall. The lower parts of the roughly 80 meter high cliff seemed almost childishly easy, with plenty of steady, pocket-like handholds. But this all changed at the height of about eight meters, where rugged, pocketed rock gave way to smooth, slippery, almost polished-looking darker stone with thin, crisscrossing cracks few and far between. An overhanging, chimney-like stone structure was visible on the left but Lara knew from experience that combined with the type of stone featured at that height the chimney was going to look deceptively easy. Perhaps the chimneying itself would be just that, but getting to and away from the chimney would be near impossible due to the fact that there were almost no proper handholds nearby. It was almost like a trap.

Higher up she could make out some magnesium marks on the wall – it was obvious someone had been in trouble high up and needed a lot of extra friction. Many climbers frowned upon the use of white chalk powder on natural walls, but rains in Mexico were so frequent the white powdery marks would be history in just a few days.

Lara heard faint laughter from above, and gazing up again she noticed someone staring down the wall from on top of the cliff. She stepped closer to the cliff, unsure whether her voice could carry all the way up. "Hello?" she hollered,

"Yeah?" was the reply. A man was peering down the rock face. Lara could not make out any facial features from such a distance but it was obvious he was of medium height and quite tanned.

"Are you Julian?" Lara yelled back.

"What?" he obviously hadn't heard a word.

Lara took a deep breath, wondering whether her efforts were simply fruitless - the windflow up the wall was simply too loud for the man to hear her. "I'm Lara Croft! Are you Julian Morrow?"

The man stared at her for a moment, then looked back over the shoulder as if talking to someone, then turned back to face Lara. "Come up!" he yelled.

Lara was taken aback. "What?"

"Come on!" the man yelled, with quite a cheerful sound. As an additional reassurance a rope was soon lowered down the cliff face, with a harness attached to the end.

Lara shrugged. She could use the exercise, and the view up there was bound to be quite something.

It took her just a few minutes to strap into the harness and open the laces of her shoes. She tied them securely onto her back, picked what she liked from the two racks and hung the gear onto her harness. She grabbed the left rope hanging from the wall and gave it a tug.

"You ready?" came a yell from above.

"Ready" Lara yelled back, her toes getting cold in the soft, muddy ground, and began climbing. As she progressed she picked off the last climber's gear from the rock wall, and higher up someone was belaying her with just the right amount of slack to allow free movement.

Some twenty minutes later she planted her bruised, sweaty palm onto the top of the cliff, looking for a more secure foothold. The climb had been even more taxing than it had looked, requiring some fancy combinations of desperate leaps, balancing on inch-wide footholds and monkey-swinging when there were no footholds at all.

Paying no attention to her surroundings she almost shrieked when her left hand which had been reaching for a shelf-like hold was grabbed hard, and with a quick pull she was hoisted up on top of the cliff. Planted on her feet she now came face to face with her belayer.

So this was Julian Morrow. He was a well-built man with a wide jaw, rugged features and long, softly curling hair with a reddish tint. It took Lara only a fraction of a second to realize the obvious – he was a genuine Scot.

"Lara Croft," he commented dryly, finally letting go of her hand. His expression was neutral but his eyes bore a hint of amusement.

"Mr Morrow, I presume." Lara untied herself from the end of the rope and handed the set of cams she'd untangled from the cliff to the man.

"Right. This is Andrew," he commented, pointing at a younger man with a bald-shaven head and bare back with intricate tattoos. Andrew was too engrossed in the scenery to approach them.

Julian glanced at Lara's bare feet and seemed to ponder something for a moment but remained silent.

"Brian reckons we're ready to go in an hour or two."

"So they sent the cavalry after me?" Julian asked with a straight face.

"I needed a break. Noah's giving me the creeps," Lara admitted.

"And Ben's not?"

Lara scowled. Julian handed her a water bottle as she sat down to pull her boots back on. "Don't waste the weather," he commented absent-mindedly and went to sit nearby. Lara joined him moments later, now taking in the scenery for the first time.

It was a wonder that place wasn't crawling with climbers. The rock was of surprisingly good quality, and from the top of the cliff one could see for miles. Mist-covered rainforest stretched into infinity, hills turned into near-mountains, waterfalls dropped into ravines and the distant step pyramids of Coba framed the scene in the far west.

For several minutes noone spoke. Andrew had slumped into the dry grass and Julian seemed lost in thought.

He gulped down the last of his water, and turned to Lara. "Like the boat?" There was more than a hint of pride in his voice.

"Mmm-hmm. More space than I'd thought. I got the cabin next to yours."

"Maybe I can pay you a late night visit then," Julian said absently. There was not the slightest hint of innuendo in his voice, nor was the comment a joke. More like an offer for company. To Lara it seemed there might often be more to Julian's words than what he actually said. This statement, however, bore no resemblance to the endless invitations for horizontal tango that followed a woman with Lara's looks wherever she went.

"So what's a Scot like you doing in Mexico?"

Julian seemed to consider his answer carefully. "Mapping out opportunities. When something interesting comes up I follow it."

"A true opportunist, then."

Julian wasn't the least bit offended, instead he seemed content with this characterization.

"What's the opportunity with Brian, then?" Lara inquired.

Julian stared out into the jungle falling at their feet. "Brian's team needed a boat. I have one."

"So you don't know what they're looking for?"

Julian seemed tired of the cross-examining. "I leave the archaeology to archaeologists like yourself. I doubt there is much that I know that would be useful to you, Lara."

Something in his blatant use of her first name irked her. It was obvious he'd seen through her questions. She had to know what Julian knew. After all, he was a potential player and something told Lara he could be a pawn that could easily be overlooked in a tragic way.

Still, he smiled, obviously not tired of Lara, just her questioning. He glanced at Andrew, who had finished tying their two ropes together and securing them to several cams in a steady-looking hold. It was obvious there would be no walking down this cliff, so they would have to rappel down.

Soon Andrew disappeared down the cliff, rappelling down using an ATC. Lara turned down the offer to go next and instead lingered behind, allowing the spectacular view one more look before she tied herself onto the rope and descending. On her way down she wondered if Julian would let her drive back, annoyed that she was in the position of having to ask in the first place.

Their drive back took nearly three hours and darkness began to set in when Julian parked the jeep near the docks. As if he'd read Lara's mind, he'd suggested that she'd drive halfway back to El Rey. They swapped drivers at Andrew's lodgings at a farm in a nearby village, and continued back to El Rey in silence as the last rays of sunlight continued to warm the leather seats of the jeep. Lara let her hair down and leaned onto the side window, almost falling asleep as they passed farms, sleepy rural villages and schoolchildren walking home.

The only stop they made was to buy some locally grown oranges from an old woman selling them by the side of the road. "To ward off scurvy," as Julian had insisted with a straight face.

The only conversation they had had was about the cenotes. Julian was a lot more experienced in cave diving than Lara and could offer some well-received pointers on the special dangers posed by the plugholes. Lara shared a couple of her cave-diving stories and Julian listened intently but without commenting. It was hard to discern what he thought of her. Whatever it was, he didn't let out any of it. Perhaps he was capable of taking her at face value, a rarity in Lara's world. After Noah Julian was a breath of fresh air. It wasn't that Noah was in her face all the time, but she was certain he'd never get to know her; he would just stick to his preconceptions of some yeti-kicking superheroine and ignore what was right in front of him. Such insistence did not quite invite Lara to try and convince him wrong in his views, she just wanted to leave him alone.

Their welcoming committee – Brian and Aricia – greeted them with a feel of urgency. "We were supposed to leave like, two hours ago," Brian commented to Julian. "I don't have a watch," he replied and squeezed past Aricia. "Madam," he commented to the latter sardonically. Lara followed him into the boat after Brian had declined her offer to help get the boat off the docks.

After leaving her backpack in her cabin Lara found Conchita sitting on the front deck as they began slowly moving away from the docks. She was drinking mineral water. She offered Lara a sip which she declined, wiggling her water bottle as a sign that she wasn't thirsty. Conchita gestured to a sunchair next to a nearby table. Lara slumped down, not realizing until then how drained she was after the taxing climb.

The thick equatorial darkness was setting in at what seemed the speed of sound. They were heading to open sea towards a distant lighthouse.

"It seems Julian's taking us quite far from the coast," Lara commented, puzzled.

Conchita shrugged. "The coastal waters are very rocky. It's better to go round the capes before going to the river."

"Do you live somewhere near here? Brian said you were from Colombia."

Conchita – or Connie, as she had pointed out she often was called – shook her head. "I still live there, at my parents house. There's no work so I came here. Brian had read my work on sacrificial cenotes and emailed me a month ago."

Lara noticed Connie wore a golden ring in her left hand but decided she had prodded her privacy enough.

"So what's the deal between Aricia and Brian?"

Conchita laughed. "She's his ex. It's like they can't stand each other but can't live without the other one either."

Lara shared her amusement. "Seems that way. What about Ben?"

Conchita sighed. "He takes everything too seriously. He's Brian's friend from high school. Noah's his cousin. That's not hard to believe, is it?"

"Not really, no." Lara wanted to ask more about Brian since it somehow seemed that Connie knew him quite well, but decided she already had enough to think about for one evening.

Noah appeared minutes later, which irked Lara. She'd enjoyed the comfortable silence she'd shared with Connie, both of them sitting with their eyes closed and listening to the sounds the water made on the sides of the boat.

He hung up some oil lamps and sat down onto the damp deck. "Now, what might our favourite yeti-hunter be thinking of so hard?" he teased.

Lara opened her eyes. Noah handed her a blanket which he'd obviously thought would be a chivalrous gesture but it was too hot. Lara folded it into a pillow and leaned back into the sunchair. "Nothing special. Just tired."

"By the way, Lara, what gauge shotgun do you use?"

Surprised by his sudden question, she listed the three models she preferred. Noah commented on each of them, usually appreciatively but complained that the heaviest one often got its firing pin jammed if any residue or moisture got in. "How do you know so much about guns?" Lara finally asked, knowing he was expecting the inquiry.

"My dad was a hunting buff, and there's really nothing to do in Iowa when you're a teenager and live on a farm so I guess I picked up a thing or two."

Glad that she'd found something to discuss with Noah without feeling slightly awkward, Lara chatted away with him, comparing prices, calibers and ranges.

Neither of them really noticed that Brian had joined them on the deck, sitting further away and listening to their light chat with a keen ear. Aricia came later to ask for him and the two snuck away into the confines of their cabin.

Conchita retreated to her cabin awhile later, and Noah left as well to have a snack, leaving Lara to enjoy some long-earned solitude. After almost drifting to sleep she fetched her satellite phone, and after a quick call to ascertain that all was going well at home, she dialed Falshingham's number.

It took awhile for him to answer. Lara was ready to give up hope of reaching him until suddenly the receiver clicked and there came an inquisitive hello from the other end.

"Falshingham, it's me."

"Lara! Is everything all right?" he asked quickly, sounding concerned.

"Relax. I'm just checking in, since I know you'd want me to. We've left Cancun, heading for Boca Paila."

"But isn't it already dark, I mean, the time must be no earlier than eight or nine p.m. there?"

"We're alright. I don't think we're going all the way today, just getting away from the craggy coast for the night. Our captain seems to know these waters very well." Lara didn't have much evidence to support this claim, but something told her Julian was no amateur.

Falshingham's nerves did not seem to be calmed by this. "Be careful, Lara," he said, not specifying the target of this warning.

"You know me, Eric," Lara joked, aware that no one ever used his first name.

Falshingham feigned a scowl. "Exactly. That's why I said it. How are you getting along with Brian?"

"Not quite sure what to think of him, to be honest. He seems like the down-to-business, no frills type, but I think there's more to it than that. Which university did you say he has gotten to finance this?"

"None. It's his own venture. His and Aricia's. I'm betting she's using family money to pay for expenses. I'm guessing that for her this is purely about archaeology."

"And for Brian a thick wad of cash would not be a bad thing."

"His father's a brilliant scholar, but I'm not sure the same could be said for Brian. He did fare well in his studies but awoke quite late to his interest in archaeology and according to his father has no patience for arduous, academical work. It's probably Aricia who's gotten him into field archaeology."

Lara scowled. "Somehow Aricia doesn't feel like quite the field archaeologist. Not that I know her very well, but still."

Falshingham did not reply.

"Anyway, I think I should probably spare the batteries on this thing," Lara commented, feeling a yawn on its way.

"And on that cue, I leave you and hope you sleep well," Falshingham said softly. "Bye Lara."

"Night, Falshingham."

She put away the phone and glanced behind her back to ensure their conversation hadn't been followed. Satisfied that no one was there, Lara got up and walked into the cabin area.

It was now fully dark, the oil lamp's light fluttering and the sound of the water getting louder. It was obvious they'd left the coastline. The doors to several cabins were shut and a somewhat loud snoring could be heard from Noah's and Benjamin's lodgings. Feeling tired but not yet ready to sleep, Lara slipped the satellite phone safely under her bed and wandered around the boat.

After finding the kitchen dark and empty and the sofa room deserted as well Lara climbed the short set of steps onto the bridge.

Julian steered, leaning onto the captain's seat but not quite sitting. "Hey there," he commented softly when noticing her.

Lara slid into the seat next to him. "How far are we going?"

"I thought I'd take us to one of Cozumel's smaller ports. We won't get ashore, but there are some good anchor spots there."

They sat in silence, both finding it hard to find a subject for conversation. Instead they just stole occasional glances, Julian obviously finding it hilarious how Lara always hastily turned away when he caught her.

There should've been some sort of tension present in such a situation but surprisingly enough, there was none.

"Do you ever get scared, Lara?"

"Excuse me?" Now that had certainly come out of the blue.

"On your travels, are you ever so scared you just want to drop everything and run?"

He seemed genuinely curious, so Lara decided to award him with an honest answer. "I do, and I've even done that several times."

"Done what?"

Lara smirked. "Now you're just teasing me," she complained.

"I'm not. What do you do then? I assume not all the running you do signifies being scared silly."

"No. Usually I'm not in a position where I can just drop everything and run."

"That's not an answer. Julian turned to face her. "What do you do then?"

"I panic, then count to ten and decide that when I get there I have to function again."

"And then you're not scared anymore?"

His inquiry into her feelings was beginning to get both tedious and offending. "No, I'm not. But at least I survive."

"Have you ever thought of finding someone you could share that fear with?"

"Was that a proposition?" Lara retorted back, fully aware that it was far from one.

"You've never thought that maybe it would be nice to let someone else be in charge for awhile?"

Lara had never thought of it that way. She felt safe when she knew what was happening and when she was relying on herself, not someone else's skills which she could never control. "I don't know."

"Still you grabbed that rope and let me belay you even though you had never met me in person. Some climbing instructors would give you quite an earful for that."

Lara gave him a hollow look. "I let you belay me because I knew that if push came to shove I could handle that wall without a rope if I had to."

Julian did not reply.


	5. Chapter 4 Gates of the underworld

**Chapter IVGates of the underworld**

Lara Croft was no stranger to dreams, premonitions and nightmares. The night following her conversation with Julian, however, revealed to Lara the extent of the nightmare unraveling during her waking hours.

In her restless dreams she hunted. The target shifted shape, first it was Brian, then herself, then Connie. As she ran darkness from a thousand black wells drew her in, dancing and swallowing her footsteps. She kept waking up and then falling back asleep, the same characters returning over and over again.

After three attempts at a normal night's sleep she slipped into a bathrobe and ventured out onto the deck.

They were now safely anchored near the resort island of Cozumel, lights from what seemed like hundreds of villas dotting the coastline. Salty-tasting, light sea winds made her shiver and the cold sweat she'd broken during her short periods of sleep was now messing her hair into damp knots.

What was she doing? She felt her mind was on overdrive trying to decide whether to befriend the team or to stick to solitude and make her decisions based on Falshingham's background info and first impressions.

Brian was a player. He wanted to find the relic at whatever cost. Lara knew his type. Reckless, occasionally courageous but always eager to cut the corners, take risks and play dirty. She did not know Brian well enough to be certain, but she'd met these mercenary types before and Brian fit the profile.

Aricia was a question mark. Whether her motives were purely archaeological Lara could not tell, but if push came to shove she could definitely hold her own against the petite ballerina-like Italian.

Julian could be a player. But what could he benefit from such a find? He did not seem to seek fortune, but with enough money he could drop work and dedicate himself to climbing and diving.

Connie seemed sincere, but was she immune to the temptation of cash the helmet could produce?

Ben was definitely a player. His silent fanaticism could pose a formidable threat if Lara had to convince someone to leave the artifact alone.

Noah Lara was unsure of. He did not seem to have any sort of personal agenda behind his involvement. Perhaps he was just looking for a free holiday in sunny Mexico.

Lara knew that trying to convince the group verbally would not work. They would simply think she would return there later to claim the prize. Leading them astray was a possibility, but with Aricia and Brian on board it would be difficult to pretend to misinterpret the same signs that to them would be as obvious as they were to Lara.

There was a slim chance that they would never find anything and would have to return empty-handed. But in that case the relic would still exist, and if Falshingham could have his way Lara would have to take up duty to guard the location until another group boated up the river to try and claim it.

They would have to find it. And Lara would have to either destroy it or ensure that it could not be used or recovered.

Destroying and artifact like that would be hard if not impossible. She'd vowed to protect history, instead of erasing it.

If one of them found it and she somehow was able to destroy it, the rest of them would just be left with incredible claims and perhaps flimsy evidence that such an artifact had existed, but nothing would point to the existence of its claimed powers, if only Lara could prevent everyone from using it.

How could she destroy it, then? The 'oops, I accidentally dropped a grenade in it' –approach would not be a preferable one since it would hurt her professional reputation and turn the group against her, with possibly even violent results, considering Ben's UFO crusade.

She'd have to find it herself. And hide it or destroy it before anyone else caught a glimpse.

And if someone else found it, it was even possible that she herself would have to resort to illegal and rather unpleasant means.

What would she do and how? The endless possibilities played themselves in her head and she knew there would be no more sleep that night.

The next morning Lara awoke with a headache. She'd dozed off after all a little before five a.m. contrary to her guess that sleep would not come at all. After downing three glasses of water and a pair of Advils she hoped would kick in soon she quickly dressed in a fresh pair of jeans and a plain green shirt and headed to the kitchen. Some leftover toast was piled on the counter along with marmalade and a fresh pot of tea.

Lara forced down a piece of toast, the pounding in her head still continuing incessantly. She was mildly worried about combining diving with her recent injury and wondered if the pressure differences could affect the renewed skull bone. Probably not, unless they dove really deep. At least the doctor had given her a cautious but reassuring assessment that she could well dive as long as she was wary of symptoms like nausea, double vision and severe, splitting headaches.

They were moving at a brisk speed, some seagulls flying past as Lara emerged onto the main deck with a glass of orange juice.

"¡Buenos días!" Conchita yelled from what seemed like a huge pile of old raincoats but turned out to be a half-inflated rubber boat.

"Morning," Lara replied, idling away to the right side of the deck where Brian and Julian were filling tanks and checking the gauges. Lara noticed that her bottles were already filled and ready. "Hey, thanks! Saved me a lot of trouble," she commented, and Brian glanced up.

"Morning. I took the liberty of changing one of your straps, it looked like the salt had corroded it pretty thin."

"Thanks. I figured I'd change it after this trip but it did look quite rickety."

Julian, sitting on the deck, was struggling with the spare filling tank, which was proving to be too wide to fit through the narrow hole between the other tanks. "Brian, could you…?"

Before he could finish Lara moved her glass to her left hand and grabbed the nozzle of the tank, lifting it just enough to fit through the gap. "Thanks, Lara." His reply was not cheerful, and even neutral would've been an exaggeration. For some reason he didn't seem to have liked Lara's answers to his prodding. Lara tried not to care, after all it had been him who'd suddenly ventured into personal matters.

Aricia sat on one of the sunchairs, reading and in Lara's opinion looking ridiculously high-maintenance for a field archaeologist.

"Lara?" It was Brian.

"Yes?" Lara put her glass down on a crate where it shifted back and forth as the waves kept throwing the boat around. She wondered who was steering since Julian was filling the tanks. Must've been Noah; she recalled Brian mentioning that they belonged to the same yachting club.

"I was trying to figure out a plan for today."

"Shoot."

"Ben says most of the reliefs pointing to the era of the last Uxmal king are centered around the southeastern borders of the ruins. There are seven cenotes there, but only four of them are deep enough that you can't see the bottom from where they probably would have dropped down stuff or shoved down their sacrifices. Connie says she's studied one of them which would be just suitable – deep and wide enough to be considered a so-called true sacrificial cenote."

"Sounds reasonable. It's usually the rule that a maximum of five people enter cenotes at a time and form a group. I assume it's you, me, Julian, Ben and Aricia?"

"Ben doesn't dive. Well, he does, but he's only done a couple of open water courses and says he's afraid of tight spaces. Also, Julian wants to stay on the boat. He says he has a hunch it's not gonna be this one, whatever it even is we're looking for."

"Right. Ben's out as well, then."

Brian looked surprised. "Just like that? But Julian said…"

"Julian can say what he likes. You hired him as captain and I'm here for the diving. It's too big a risk to have someone on the team who could potentially freak out inside, and reel in the ropes or whathaveyou."

Julian glanced up. "I agree with Croft here."

Brian looked confused, staring at Julian. "Didn't you say you could train Ben?"

"I said I could train him for dives into the cavern which have both dry and wet areas. The kinds of cenotes we're heading to are deep, dark and the bottom blows up so that the visibility can be down to zero. If she doesn't want him there I respect her opinion."

That could have sounded like Lara was being overprotective but there was no hint of that in Julian's tone. He sounded plainly appreciative.

They were now approaching shore, and Julian abandoned the tanks and hurried onto the bridge. Soon Noah, looking invigorated and well-slept, emerged onto the deck. Brian returned to the tanks and Lara decided to take Julian's place in assisting him.

Noah went to chat with Connie. After all, they had their own plans to make, being the surface team.


	6. Chapter 4 part 2

Two hours later the sun was still creeping towards the zenith, but Brian, Lara and Aricia were sporting their wetsuits and making their way through the thick bushes, following an ancient-looking path deeper away from the river. Noah and Connie had stayed at the boat, connected to the hikers via a long-distance portable radio. Ben had decided to come along to help them if they happened to need some ropes set.

Then they saw it. It was as if some invisible giant had taken his fist and pounded it into the soft, laterite ground, making an almost perfectly round plughole. Treeroots wound down to the opening.

The surface water glistened in shades of turquoise, but deep down the colour was a deep, velvety black and looked like a maw. A small waterfall cascaded down on the other side. The walls were some ten meters high and looked almost holdless. They would have to rappel themselves in.

Lara and Ben set into securing a set of ropes onto nearby trees, and Aricia and Brian made a final inventory of their gear. The neon yellow safety rope was stacked and restacked, tanks checked and crosschecked and the harnesses they had been smart enough to bring along were tugged and turned. Lara admired Brian's meticulous checking but knew she would have to recheck her own gear anyway. It was a habit she refused to kick, otherwise she could easily forget it and all could go to hell in a hand basket.

Lara and Ben's arrangement was quite smart. They'd tied vertical ropes to two opposing trees, making a sort of a swing set which could be used without a harness to lower them into the water.

For a moment Lara stopped at the edge of the maw to look in. It was no wonder the ancient tribes had thought cenotes to be windows into the underworld – such uninviting and devilish holes looked ready to swallow you whole if you did not try all and everything to get out. It was the stuff of nightmares, but not enough to scare Lara.

Neither Brian nor Aricia were showing signs of nervousness. They helped one another throw the tanks onto their backs, shortened the straps and fastened their goggles ready onto their foreheads.

One by one the three of them grabbed Lara and Ben's swing ropes and lowered themselves into the water. It was cold but not unpleasantly so – just a refreshing change from the humid, hot air.

Lara threw the end of the safety rope to Ben who fastened it into their rope swing. He'd be staying by the cenote until they resurfaced.

Deep down, all colour disappeared. Lara's green and blue wetsuit turned into grey, and then into near black. Even the neon safety line lost its shine as they descended into the engulfing darkness of the cenote. Small, seemingly eyeless fishes swam past in shoals, and the deeper they dove the less they saw anything living.

Lara took great care in avoiding the stalactites that had formed on the ceiling. It was hard to keep directions straight in her mind – the sheer darkness combined with being underwater toyed with her sense of up and down. The surface seemed miles away and the hole through which they'd arrived had not been visible for nearly half an hour. This was no diver's paradise – it was approaching a nightmare. The heavy-duty underwater lights they were carrying offered little solace in the desolate darkness. With a little imagination one could imagine ancient sea monsters lurking somewhere close. Lara, however, let no such notions into her head. Confined spaces had never bothered her unless she was being chased. In some way, even though the cenote was narrow and rather depressing, the atmosphere held an air of tranquility.

Lara took occasional glances behind her. Brian was following her close by, but Aricia was obviously lagging behind. Lara wondered if the confined spaces were getting to her, or if she simply was a slow swimmer.

The cavern narrowed and according to Lara's diving watch had gotten steeper – like a chimney straight into the centre of the earth. After a particularly narrow spot through which Lara had to navigate with her hands stretched out in front of her, the corridor widened and eventually opened into a surprisingly wide gallery.

A faint light shone from an opening in the ceiling. There were no air pockets. Lara sighed, and continued on away from the entrance so that Brian and Aricia could dive in as well. She signaled them into a semicircle and pointed at the partly lit ceiling. Brian made a circle with his hands, arguing that there could have been another opening above them. Aricia swam upwards to peer into what seemed like a crack in the rock, looking rather hopeful. Lara guessed she was not too keen on returning the same way they'd arrived.

Lara turned on her lamp to the highest setting, and let the light wander around the chamber. This was, without doubt, the terminal point of the cenote shaft, and if there was something worth finding in this location, it would be here.

Aricia had stopped kicking and was simply flopping in the underwater current, taking quick glances around. Lara began suspecting she was about to get nervous enough to get into trouble if she didn't find something for her to do. She grabbed Aricia's lamp from her hand, turned it onto the highest setting, and made a demonstrative circle with it to signal that she should do what Lara herself was doing; surveying the cavern.

Brian was feeling the bottom with his hand; their diving around had raised some fine mud from the bottom, lowering visibility considerably. Lara glanced at the watch and the tank gauge. They'd have to head back soon. She was glad there was just the one corridor up and no crossroads. The neon line was still steady in her hand. She gave it a good tug. To her chagrin she felt the end, somewhere far up, snap and the line go limp in her hand. However, after approximately a minute of waiting the line became taut again; Ben must've noticed it coming loose and retied it into a tree or something.

She glanced at Brian, raising her eyebrows. Brian shrugged; he'd found nothing. Even though Lara could in no way be certain they were at the wrong location, she had a hunch this was not the one. The opening was too easy to find, too big and too inviting, if one could possibly call a dark, ominous-looking cenote inviting, that is.

Lara tapped her watch to indicate they had to leave. Aricia was looking relieved as her lamp had begun to dim, and she quickly swam to the entrance side of the cavern to join Lara and Brian. Lara headed for the entryway and Brian flinched to follow her, but she raised her hand and gestured that Aricia should follow and Brian come after her. She was concerned Aricia could flip because of the "last-in-line" –phenomenon; the eerie feeling that there was nothing behind you except darkness, and in that darkness something could be coming after you without being seen.

Taking care not to get tangled in with the neon line, Lara kicked slowly upwards, taking care not to hurry and give Aricia something to flip about. They had plenty of oxygen left, and she wanted to make sure she hadn't missed any difficult-to-spot entryways or side caverns.

There were none. The cenote was of simple design; just one shaft leading into a bigger, bubble-shaped cavern, where only a couple of pieces of tree roots lay on the bottom. No helmets, no skulls – the Mayans hadn't even bothered to use this one as a sacrificial well. For a moment Lara pondered if they'd have similarly dire success in the other locations as well. There were hundreds of discovered and even more undiscovered cenotes in the Yucatan Peninsula, and unless Brian had solid proof that one of these particular cenotes was the resting place of the helmet Lara's job of leading them astray would perhaps be easier that she'd thought – they would simply find nothing.

Still, one day, somebody could.

Which meant that a wild-goose chase did not solve the biggest problem: did the helmet exist at all, and how could a disaster be prevented if it was ever found?

Julian was stretching his back in one of the sunchairs when they returned from the cenote. Ben had gotten bitten by some spider while reading his notes on a treetrunk and was sporting a rather puffy leg which had luckily proven quite painless. Brian was concerned it could get infected or get worse but Ben refused to let anyone take a closer look at it.

"Wild goose chase, then?" Julian joked when Lara had given him a short report on their trip.

"I wouldn't say that. At least we know for certain now that it isn't in that particular cenote. That's a success in itself." She slumped down into another sunchair and pulled a towel hanging from the railings to cover her bare legs. Brian and Aricia had disappeared inside the boat.

Lara squinted in the afternoon sun. "I think Aricia was about to flip, you know."

Julian sipped his can of strong Mexican beer. "No surprise there. She said to Brian yesterday she didn't want to go but he said he wouldn't hear of it."

"Some teamwork between those two."

Julian took off his sunglasses and looked Lara straight in the eyes. "Connie told you they were ex?" He didn't seem surprised. He knew Connie liked to gossip, though she never meant any harm to the subjects.

"Did she tell you why?"

Lara shook her head.

"Brian had wandered into archaeology at uni probably because he figured it would be an easy subject and a sure fire way for a neat desk job. It was Arie who got him into fieldwork; and in the end he got really into it; he even wanted to fix up some sort of a commission firm with her. Probably dreamt of doing something similar to yourself. But she preferred to remain a serious pro, not a grave robber."

"Thank you," Lara scowled half-heartedly. She'd heard the accusation so many times she was beyond caring. Arguing back was just a habit.

"I didn't mean you. Money's what motivates him, not science. She was probably afraid that he'd be willing to destroy something of historical value, in order to cash the valuables."

"Chasing ancient astronauts doesn't sound like much of a cash cow."

Julian stood up. "Think about the potential."

Lara shrugged. "Put it that way, it could entice someone like Brian. By the way, how do you know so much about the guy?"

"Brian? When I met him in Cancun he was still on the rebound from Arie. Told me the whole story one night. I figured he wanted to blow off some steam before he saw her again. He probably wanted to be able to act civil with the rest of us present." Julian walked past her, pausing by the door. "See you at dinner?"

"Mmm-hmm." Lara had raised the towel onto her face as a sunshade.

"I hope you like Trivial Pursuit," Julian smirked before retreating inside.


	7. Chapter 4 part 3

"I have no bloody clue about American newspapers," Lara complained.

"You got the previous seventeen questions right, stop griping," Noah pointed out. "Just name a paper and get on with it." Noah's irritation was probably largely due to the fact that Lara, Connie and Julian were winning by a large margin.

"The New York Times."

Brian shook his head, putting down the card. "USA Today."

Lara shot Noah a playful look which melted his chagrin into a smile. "Told you so."

Aricia rolled the dice.

Connie picked up a card for her. "What was the first feature-film trilogy to be shot concurrently with the same cast?"

Aricia seemed to be caught by surprise. "I'm not good with movies. Godfather?"

Connie shook her head. "Lord of The Rings," commented Brian, and Connie shot him an appreciative look. "That's right."

Ben could successfully translate 'alectophobic' as 'afraid of chickens', but eventually they could not catch up to Lara's team. They won by a mile, and Lara high-fived Julian and Connie.

"Good work, Croft," Julian commented before heading to the kitchenette area to clean the dishes.

"I have one more question," Ben said, eyeing Lara with a strange look in his eyes.

Lara leaned forward over the table. "Go ahead."

"I was just wondering if Lara could name the constellation after which the most notable cathedrals in France were modeled?"

Lara looked puzzled. "What has that got to do with anything?"

"I heard you telling someone on the phone you did not believe in ancient astronauts. It seems that you do not know much about the associated mythology concerning, for instance, the reasons why there is so much evidence of medieval and even ancient cultures having access to astronomical facts only revealed by science during the 20th century."

Brian looked surprised, and slightly irritated at his mention of the subject.

"You heard right. I don't support the theory." Lara crossed her arms on her chest. She did not like where this was heading.

"Then, I wonder if the revered dr Croft believes in coincidence?"

"I do." Lara tried to sound as honest as she could. She could not decide what sort of approach would be the most suitable for her to select – to express no interest in the subject matter at all, or dismiss Ben's dear theory as esoteric bollocks. She had no faith that the rest of the team could be reassured that she was there just for an idle holiday. They knew her by reputation and if they didn't worry that she wanted to be a part of the discovery they were either amazingly naïve or somewhat stupid. Lara decided it was best to play the science card. "I do not believe all great cultures that disappeared were the disciples of stellar travelers. Daeniken, the poster boy of this figment of imagination you call a theory has admitted to forging some of his evidence. That's enough for me"

Ben looked exasperated. In Lara's eyes he was the spitting image of a typical fanatic – an isolationist who felt it necessary to impose his ideas on anyone willing to listen or argue. "So one stale apple spoils the rest and that's it? Daeniken is not the only one in support of the theory. Are you familiar with Zecharia Sitchin?"

Connie looked concerned. "Sitchin is not an archaeologist, and he never used archaeological evidence in support of his views."

Ben was unfazed by this. "Sitchin was the first one to offer a complete explanation of the astronauts' behaviour."

"Care to enlighten me?" Lara's expression was hard. Julian was watching her carefully from a few feet away.

"It all makes perfect sense. They did not allow humans to view them unless they'd cleansed themselves first – to protect the visitors from earth microbes. Also, they would've probably looked very frightening to the ancient dwellers. Landing on mountaintops conserved energy and protected them from humans. Human sacrifices were common at all the central sites with traces of alien influences; such practice is always associated with great tragedy – such as these visitors leaving. The humans would've been desperate to get these visitors back. It all makes so good sense – including the ark of the Covenant, everything. That, by the way, was probably used as a means to communicate with the visitors from a distance."

Lara tried to look neutral but couldn't hide her amusement. "Fable well told. Where's the evidence then?" Some of Daeniken's original notions had been quite intriguing, but Ben's version was nothing short of science fiction.

"Every major ancient culture featured gateways to heaven in their biggest structures: the Israelites had As-Sakhra, the Egyptians did this in all their main pyramids: shafts leading into space. Teotihuacan has a similar pyramid design, the Torreon at the Macchu Picchu as well."

"That proves nothing. They could've well been used for air vents for the construction workers or as some sort of astronomical observation points."

"True. But why? How do you explain all these cultures' extreme-level infatuation with the night sky?"

"That's not difficult to understand. The sky is vast, limitless – a dark contrast to the security these people tried to build around themselves in their cities and villages. And you can't build a fence in the sky and claim it as your territory, which you can easily do on a mountaintop or in the desert."

"Why are there astronaut-like figures in all the major cultures, depicted at the holy sites?"

"All these theories depend on the notion of prehistoric people as a bunch of incompetent, forgetful savages who couldn't do anything for themselves. It would be highly unlikely that every great culture could've been guided by aliens. Maybe one or two could have, in theory. Also, Daeniken and his lot just never considered the relationship between the natives' religion

"Then how do you explain the ever-present virgin birth myth found in most sacral texts including the Bible?"

"People want miracles, and that's always a good story. And not too complicated to come up with. It's quite logical that gods would not have to obey the biological rules of messy lovemaking and even messier birth."

"You're just banalizing it all, aren't you?" Ben looked almost furious.

Even Connie seemed surprisingly irritated at her strong views. She wouldn't have taken her for a believer. Wasn't Connie supposed to be in this all just for her interest in the anthropological side of the cenotes – the sacrifices? "What about the Dropas?" she asked.

"Excellent point," Concluded Ben.

Brian was simply listening and watching Lara. Julian was drying the glasses but Lara realized he was listening as intently as Brian. Aricia looked rather nonplussed by it all.

"The Dropas?" Lara asked. Now this was something new.

Connie leaned back into the sofa. "Beijing University did some excavations in the Baran Kara Ula region of the Himalayas awhile ago. They found what seemed to be artificially carved tunnels with complex structures, underground storerooms – and a burial chamber. Lying inside they found the mummified remains of two individuals measuring little more than four feet. They had been very frail and with disproportionately large skulls."

Lara remained silent for a moment, images from her trip to Area 51 floating to memory. Nevermind them, she had to keep up with her alleged skepticism. "And the mummies have since mysteriously disappeared, I fathom. That's no less crap than the claim that the Nazca lines are runways for UFOs."

Ben looked like he was at a loss of words. Connie's face was nearly expressionless all but for a hint of indignancy.

Suddenly, Ben turned to Brian.

"Brian, bring the manuscripts."

"But we agreed that she wouldn't…"

Ben turned to face him. "Look, she doesn't even believe this 'crap' as she so eloquently put it. So what's the harm? I just want to ask her what sort of explanation she could possibly cook up for the Mayans to go through such trouble to hide just an old, rusty warrior helmet."

Lara remained silent. If this was how she was going to get to see the manuscript replicas through which they had found the clues to the helmet's location, then she would not reveal all her cards just yet.

Six pairs of eyes were locked onto Lara, as she tried to hide her confusion and bewilderment. In front of her, in the dim light of the kitchen area lamp, lay a formidable collection of engraving prints, maps, photographs and photocopies of ancient stelae texts. Some of them came from Uxmal, some from the other parts of the Quintana Roo district, but most were from Muyil pyramids and temples.

Putting this set together had been an immense feat, one that should, according to Brian, be attributed to Aricia.

Some of the images were just parts of Ben's substantial evidence, but nonetheless suggested that there perhaps had been something strange at work during the Muyil era. This was evidence beyond Daeniken's feeble attempts. Series of very factual inscriptions depicted the last king of Muyil and Uxmal giving away his crown, replacing it with a strange, squarish headdress which completely covered his head. Then he was seen in his burial dress, the helmet carried by priests. Dozens of bodies lay at their feet, and in the background, even though the pictoral language was rather ceremonial, a sobering sight: villagers pierced by spears, entrails hanging.

Gods from high above were witnessing the ceremony with angry expressions, and some of the priests were raising their hands in a desperate, inviting gesture. Lara marveled at the expressive force of the images: they were like a testament of a complete culture in its death throes, desperate to leave some sort of remnant of themselves behind.

The pictures were probably in a mixed order, since the next images depicted tall gods with the strangely shaped helmets walking the earth with villagers shielding their eyes and priests falling at their feet. Behind them, strange means of transport stood on four wheels.

This was no science fiction. A part of Lara was telling her pictures like these could easily be faked, and reasoned that was the reason why they hadn't gone public with it all. "Where have you gotten these?" she half-gasped, half spoke.

Julian was still by the kitchen sink, looking strangely unaffected. Connie was leaning onto the doorframe. "It's just a matter of looking for the right things. This came from a broken pillar. I put the images together with Arie. The pillar was in a thousand pieces, as though someone had wanted to make sure it was going to be difficult to put it all together. I guess the Mayans decided this was not a story to be remembered after all. Maybe they realized it was the end and wanted to give the impression it was their own making. Nothing's as strong as human pride. Perhaps they were even angry at the visitors for leaving."

Lara leafed through the pile of documents. Modern satellite images lay superimposed on temple wall engravings, pointing to perhaps a four-square mile area in the nearby jungle.

She tore herself away from it all, turning her gaze to Ben. "Still, it's your crusade, not mine." She left the room, furious at the fact that she couldn't just light a match and make the whole pile of papers a bonfire.

These people were like moths, curious and self-centered enough to fly into the fire and get burned to cinder in the process. She feared the power of these images, feared what such a discovery would mean to her, to them, to everyone.

Lara was a firm believer in the saying that those who did not wish to know their history were doomed to repeat it. But even she realized the limitations of the human psyche: if suddenly confronted with the evidence that perhaps humans were not the superior beings, that there could be someone much wiser, that humans had made all sorts of mistakes – that would rob them of their purpose, their belief that they could do what's right. Without the illusion of being omnipotent it's difficult to strive to evolve, to believe that only better times could lay ahead. The notion of aliens would cause this. And Lara was unsure whether she herself was any better prepared for such a revelation than any other human.


	8. Chapter 5 Ancient astronauts

**Chapter VAncient astronauts**

Lara sat on her bedbunk until the boat became silent. Some heated conversation echoed from Brian and Aricia's cabin – nothing new there. Shadows danced on the walls, and the occasional glittery reflection from the aft lamps glowed through the low windows. Lara's cabin was at the waterline.

It was dark again. Lara hugged her knees into her chest, gazing out the window into the jungle visible some twenty meters outside the boat. For a moment she played with the thought of just leaving, giving the responsibility to someone else, retreating from the whole ordeal. But she knew Falshingham would not forgive her. And the other possible consequences were even worse.

Then, without a word, there was a knock on the door. Lara did not aknowledge it. Nevertheless, the door opened, and Julian slipped in.

"I figured you weren't sleeping."

Lara looked away, but made room on the bed.

They sat in silence. Julian shifted Lara's holster, discarded and forgotten on the floor, with his foot. Lara stretched her legs out onto the mattress. "Julian?"

"Yes?"

"Remember when I told you about the counting?"

He nodded.

"Well, it isn't helping. This... thing that we're looking for – part of me is still not believing the theory on its origins, but a friend of mine whose word I've never had to doubt is very assured this is the near equivalent of the holy grail. If that's the case then it has to stay hidden, or should be destroyed."

To her surprise Julian just nodded.

"You're not gonna tell me it should be brought to the public and used for the benefit of all mankind?"

"No. If we were a unified mankind that could be possible, but looking at the current state of affairs in the world I doubt it would do much good. I trust your judgement."

"But who am I to decide whether the world is ready for this or not?"

"There's always someone, some extraordinary person to make the decisions. You might laugh at the comparison but look at Moses. He was just an ordinary guy given a huge responsibility he did not want, but he handled it as best as he could and fared quite well."

"But it's different. I'm not dragging anyone through the desert and parting oceans."

"No. But you are neutral enough to consider the benefit of all before just you or your kindred. And that is a rare trait."

Lara laughed. "Who are you, Julian?"

"A guy who has a lot of time on his hands. I used to be a diplomat and held a post in Bolivia. That's where I met Connie, when she was working for a project to identify the remains found in a mass burial site. She lost her husband to the guerrillas, I lost my family."

"I'm sorry," was all Lara could muster. She, too, had lost a lot of friends to conflicts.

"If sorry could bring them back they would've already returned years ago."

Lara did not say anything.

"That led me to believe this selflessness is not a trait you can find in politics. After all, the impulse to get into politics is always spurred by the desire to either change or achieve something. It's not a very good starting point for neutralism."

"So did you have anything to do with Connie's involvement in all this? She said Brian had read her paper on the sacrificial use of the cenotes and emailed her?"

"Frankly, that's bullshit. The reason Connie hasn't got much work at home is that she has publicly attacked the Bolivian government for not granting a guy named Alan Alford an excavation permit to Tiahuanaco. You do know the location, don't you?"

"I am aware, at least, that von Daeniken thinks that whole culture that resided there is one of the pieces of evidence pro-ancient astronauts. I have visited the site once, but on quite different business. It is a magnificent feat of architecture, but I wouldn't say there's been anything extraterrestrial at work there."

"Tiahuanaco has been robbed and re-robbed. It's been blasted by desert winds and gnawed by erosion for too long for any evidence found there to be more than circumstancial. But Connie believes in the place. She also thinks that the reason why so many South American high-culture sites were abandoned well before the conquistadors was the aliens' departure and those cultures, nurtured for a long time by the leadership of these "ancient astronauts", simply perished because they were unable to govern themselves as efficiently."

"Anyway, what's your part in all this?"

"I know Brian's father. He taught me at Cambridge. It was he who gave Brian the hint that I was here and for hire. I discussed the trip with him – he was all too reluctant to let me in on what they were looking for, but eventually seemed to decide that I'd find out anyway. He had no choice but to trust me, I guess. I told him about Connie, which seemed to put him at ease since it revealed I was already familiar with the theory."

To Lara this sounded reasonable enough. But one thing still remained a mystery – why would Julian give a toss about whether they found anything or not? She confronted him on this.

"As I said, I used to work in a field where you saw what happened when conflicts of interest became actual conflicts. I saw that Brian was not the guy that should get to lay his hands on a thing like that, if it existed."

"So you do believe that actual aliens influenced Mayans and a list of other remarkably successful ancient cultures?"

"I've seen strange things, Lara. Out here –" he swept his hand in a wide gesture towards the open sea. "- and down there-" he pointed at the dark jungle beyond the river. "Lights. Voices. If there's something here it might not be alien. But it sure isn't the Muppets either. Hell, aliens are as good an explanation as anything else. What about you?"

Lara did not reply right away. True, she had witnessed some otherworldly things, but they had only made her certain that no universal, simple explanation could cover all of it. "Let's just say I'll always give such things the benefit of a doubt."

In the morning, not much was spoken during breakfast. Ben seemed more amicable towards her, probably rejoicing over the fact that his evidence had clearly had an impact on her. Connie was as pleasant as ever, but seemed more distant now. Lara wondered if there was a lot more to her than met the eye. According to Julian, she wasn't merely the soft-spoken righteous and down-to-earth anthropologist the image of she was visibly attempting to project. Aricia she didn't even want to start contemplating on.

In an attempt to escape the near-zero atmosphere of the kitchen, Lara ventured out onto the deck. There she found Brian, who was typing on a laptop. Julian was nowhere to be to be seen; the only clue to his whereabouts was the faint sloshing coming from the starboard side of the boat. Soon he emerged back onto the deck, after climbing up a short set of stairs. "Wanted to get a head start for the diving today?" she asked, shading her eyes with her palm.

"Morning, Lara." Julian had announced the previous evening that he was determined not to miss the next cenote. The previous one he'd skipped gladly, seeing right from the maps that it was not going to be much of a scenic route. The next one on their map – second of the four cenotes connected by the ancient roads depicted in Ben's engraving copies – was considerably bigger, and would probably prove to be more difficult to navigate. Also, the entrance was hard to reach, and thus they would make good use of Julian and Lara's climbing skills.

This cenote was the nearest to Muyil and, in Lara's opinion, an unlikely candidate for the hiding of a precious artifact. But she was keen on seeing the cenote itself. According to a tattered copy of a diving guidebook for the Quintana Roo area, it had been explored by at least one group of divers, but its inaccessibility had prevented it from becoming a tourist attraction. The one group that had dove its waters a decade earlier had commented on its beauty, and according to them there was some sort of a dry chamber as well, which sounded strange considering the whole cave network seemed to lie underneath the nearby river's waterline.

"Julian, I figured we could bring along a couple of technical ladders. You got any?"

Drying his hair, Julian seemed to think for a moment. "I've got a couple but they're old and I wouldn't trust them to hold if a cam broke loose or something. You have your own climbing gear with you?"

"I do. Even though you had a pretty solid rack; I wouldn't have minded borrowing again."

Julian faked a scolding look. "Now Lara Croft, didn't your climbing instructor tell you never to borrow stuff?"

Lara laughed. "He did. To be precise, he told me I wouldn't last a year if I continued on my chosen level of recklessness."

"And that was how long ago?"

"Ten years. I never borrow rope, and same thing goes for carabiners. You never know if they've been clonked onto rocks one time too many."

Julian nodded. "You ever use quickdraws?"

"For backup, yes, but I prefer trad gear to sports gear."

Brian shot them a glance. This was obviously a conversation he could not partake in. "Julian?"

Julian put away his towel and knelt on the deck next to Brian's laptop. "Shoot."

"I checked the tanks this morning and it seems that the tubing to the regulators look a bit more worn than they were before yesterday. Could it be there was a substantial amount of sulphur in the water?"

"I wouldn't know. Lara?" he turned to face her. After all, she'd been there on the previous day's dive.

"I didn't smell anything, at the least. But the whole of Mexico is a volcanic steamcooker, any sulphuric gases could've come from the soil as well and dissolve straight into the water."

Connie walked up to them from the entranceway. "Brian's right. Part of the cenote birth process, and the factor that determines where they are born are often geothermal movements. Volcanic warmth changes the density of water in some part of the soil, and if there is a river it could collapse a part of the self-supporting landmass anchored by trees. When this support is lost the ground drops, a hole is formed which soon fills with water, and the ground keeps sinking until all the softer material has either dissolved into the water or packed down to the cenote bottom."

"Could there be any danger from sudden eruptions of gas?"

Connie shook her head. "Unlikely. And if there was such an occurrence it would not cause much of a stir for divers as the water would act as a sort of an impact cushion. In addition to this, after all the softer soil is dissolved or packed down by the process, the cenote is protected and supported by the denser soil in the walls. So, unless there was a volcanic vent in the bottom I wouldn't say you were in a risk for the gases to cause serious injury. I would worry about the equipment, though."

Lara nodded. "All that explains the rich mineral content of the water and the abundance of stalactites in the caverns." She took off her sweater – the sun was quickly rising and it was getting hot. "I want to see the regulators."

Connie turned on her heels. "I'll take you down and we'll take a look."

They descended into the storeroom. Lara sat down cross-legged onto the floor and gathered the regulators in a neat row in front of her, comparing the tube thicknesses and their flexibility. True enough, the ones Brian, Aricia and Lara herself had used the previous day had distinct grayish lines running down the length of them, and some fine rubber dust was coming off of them. Still, they did not look severely compromised.

Connie was leaning onto the doorframe, watching her. "Brian wants you out." She stated, her tone indistinct.

Lara looked up. "Now? Couldn't he tell me himself?" she sounded indignant.

Connie knelt down to absent-mindedly fiddle with a regulator. "Tomorrow, probably. I told him about the regulators and he decided we ought to head to Uxmal anyway to replenish the foodstuffs. We could get some spare parts for the tanks as well. He said he was going to arrange your payment and tell you that he'd learned enough and you could continue your holiday in Cancun or wherever you wanted." She sounded almost apologetic.

"Why are you telling me this?" Lara stared at her. This was a strange turn. Connie had obviously disliked her skepticism and even seemed as though she might think Lara was unworthy of this discovery. And now she was letting her in on Brian's logic.

"If Brian finds it, it'll go to some collector. Plus I don't want Julian to lead the dives into those three cenotes alone. The last one – the one Noah and I reckon could be the one but Brian disagrees - is big, I can tell. And no one has dove in it before."

"What about Aricia? Can't you trust her to make the right decisions over Brian?"

"Arie may be a brilliant scholar, but determination-wise she's just no match for Brian. She got enough of being tagged along, that's the core reason for why they separated. At least this is the impression Julian's got."

Lara gazed past her into the hallway. Somewhere up there was Julian, the one piece in this mess she couldn't still quite put her finger on.

Their second cenote was, indeed, formidable in size. They had chosen the order in which they would dive the four cenotes by convenience; the first ones were nearer to the river and thus would not be too annoying as wild goose chases. And if their reasoning as to which cenotes were the most likely to house relics was wrong, then finding the helmet – or something else of prestige – in the first cenotes instead of the last ones would be a nice surprise.

Julian and Brian had taken the lead in the winding underwater pathways leading to the inner cenote. Aricia followed them closely, tailed by Lara. Aricia seemed to just swim on without paying much attention to her surroundings, but Lara acted quite the opposite. She'd taken along an underwater writing slate, and every time they passed a side tunnel she tried to draw a quick reference mark to it on her makeshift cenote blueprint. It was getting increasingly difficult to document and follow the lead divers as they seemed to swim faster the deeper they got.

The cenote was not as dark or steep as the previous one. It was full of strange, almost man-made –looking niches, and small bones – probably rodents' – decorated the cracks in the bottom. It was likely that some parts of the cenote had been dry and later filled by water. Eerie, blue lights played in the walls, created by bluish crystals catching the light of Lara's lamp. She occasionally glanced behind her into the darkness closing behind her. For some reason she did not feel comfortable pointing her light in the direction from which they'd come.

She plunged forward, desperate to keep up with Julian and the rest. The cavern took a sharp U-turn and stalactites scraped Lara's foot as she slid past a narrower part. She looked down to see if her leg was bleeding, but when she returned her gaze forward she noticed the others were nowhere to be seen. Julian was using a blue safety line which was not visible in the murky water. Lara took a deep breath, telling herself there were not that many directions to choose from.

In the end, she didn't have to choose. Brian's head appeared at a crossroads and he slowly waved his lamp. Lara kicked forward, and followed him to an adjacent corridor where Aricia and Julian were waiting. Julian pointed forward into the widening corridor, and Lara nearly gasped when she realized what he was trying to show her.

A stony hall opened some thirty meters above into a lagoon shining in blue and green. It was obvious a large part of it was completely dry: surface shimmered some twenty meters above, and grey rocks framed the scene somewhere above, cliffs rising into a nature-made dome somewhere high up – how high Lara could not tell because of the distortion caused by the water. Light was sifting in from somewhere, some of it lighting even the bottom where some white fishes were swimming in frantic shoal turns.

They were at the bottom level of the cave, and took no time in diving up to the surface. Aricia was the first to surface. Bobbing gently in the crystal-clear water, she tore off her diving mask and regulator, and took a deep breath. Lara, Brian and Julian followed suit, and soon they had all climbed up onto the shore. Tree roots hung from the ceiling like drapes, and stalactites and stalagmites were in abundance, some of them stretching in a uniform structure from the bottom to the high dome, shaped like stretched bubblegum. Some stalagmites stood thick and frosted-looking with the look of old, wise men.

Lara sighed. "This is quite something."

The others could do nothing but silently agree. Gone was the ominous blackness of the entranceway, this was a world of light.

Brian picked up a broken stalactite piece and inspected it. "Somehow I doubt this is the place."

Lara had to agree. "First of all, it's too pretty" she joked, and they shared a grin.

Aricia chimed in. "Second, there's no way anyone without a tank could've dove down here. There are no skulls, not other signs of visitation or sacrifice."

Lara thought about it for a moment. "I did see some rodent bones in the corridor quite near this area. I think it's fairly certain most of the entryway was once completely dry. Maybe an earthquake or flood filled it. There's no way to tell when and how this might've happened."

Brian seemed to agree. "That doesn't really contradict anything. If this was accessible once without diving gear it would make it more likely that this place was used. But in that case it wouldn't have been a difficult thing to come here. Plus the entrance is easy to find and quite obvious even though the climb was quite taxing, and as you said, this place is way too pretty, and first of all, way too big to hide anything, or to be used for sacrifice."

Julian seemed to assess this all for a moment. "We did use climbing gear, but I'll bet there is some sort of alternate route from the inland site, and even if there's not it's not impossible to negotiate our route without climbing gear."

Aricia agreed. "According to Connie only those cenotes from which there was no chance that the victims could climb out themselves were used for sacrifice. The entrance was like a set of steps. I agree with her that it would be logical to use such places for discarding unwanted relics as well."

"Nice daytrip, anyway," Julian remarked and tore off his flippers, sitting down onto a nearby stone.

Lara dug out a granola bar she's hidden under her wetsuit pant leg and began chewing away. At one point Julian stole it and took a bite. For that, Lara nonchalantly pushed him into the lagoon.

Brian and Aricia were inspecting the wall crystals, chatting away more amicably than usual. Lara wondered if it could've been that her joining the team brought on the animosities between the former couple? She decided no, they had enough dirty laundry to sort to begin with. After all, she didn't even know what sort of image Aricia had of her – whether she grouped Lara in with Brian's lot, or thought of her as a scholar like herself.

They didn't have to hurry back since they did not have to use their tanks. There was a faint scent of sulphur in the air and Lara worried slightly for their gear, but after inspecting her own regulator and seeing it had not suffered from their dive she was able to put her mind at rest.

Julian had pulled his gear back on and was inspecting the bottom. He surfaced after a good fifteen minutes, something small and off-white in his hand. He gave it to Lara.

"More rodent bones," she replied. It was obvious this cavern had been well accessible without wetting one's feet at all. Bloody tourist trap, she joked to herself.

Aricia seemed more relaxed than during the previous day's dive. Lara still couldn't help but wonder if her and Brian's probably not unanimous decision to kick her from the team had had an impact on that, or whether it was just due to the spectacular surroundings.

The next morning, just as Connie had told Lara, Brian announced that they would spend the day resting and replenishing their stocks of food and spare parts. They would head to Punta Allen, a nearby port town.

Julian docked them into the main port of Punta Allen, near to the shopping district and restaurants. The town seemed like a typical, sleepy rural port, with enough tourism to promote growth but not enough money coming in to enlarge it into a true city. Seagulls screeched on the port planks, children played with small, black crabs on the beach.

Noah and Ben decided to head for beer, and quickly disappeared into a seaside tavern. Connie and Aricia went shopping for foodstuffs, leaving Julian, Brian and Lara to take care of the gear. They decided to walk to the centre of town. Julian knew a local diving instructor who also sold spare gear from his diving school.

Brian was wearing his Panama hat again, and Lara had borrowed one of Connie's straw hats to shield herself from the sun. She'd woken up with a severe headache, probably mostly due to the heavy sun exposure from their hike to the second cenote and back.

When they got to the shop, Brian gave her the task of finding replacement tubing for all the regulators. He and Julian went to talk to the owner. Or so they said. Instead, Brian asked Julian outside, and they seemed to share quite a heated conversation during which Julian tore off his sunglasses and stared at Brian, visibly furious. They stood in silence for a moment, Lara watching them from behind a large plant inside the shop. She could not make out words, but it was more than obvious the two men were in grave disagreement over something – probably Lara herself, since she'd been sent elsewhere for them to have this discussion in the first place. Normally Lara would not have obeyed such a blatant order – Brian had not asked but simply told her to go and look for the spares – but she remembered Falshingham's directions well, and they included appearing as harmless as possible. Disobeying a request from a team leader certainly did not project that image.

Julian made a long speech to Brian, and he seemed to yield. They returned to the shop, not noticing Lara watching them, and headed to the office area to find the owner. When they returned with a receipt and a pair of regulator mouthpieces and a new spare tank, Brian flashed a vague smile. "Let's go."

Julian shot Lara a warning look and leaned closer after Brian had disappeared behind a corner. "Don't say anything to him. He knows Connie told you he wanted you out. I told him I wouldn't dive the third cenote without you. He had to give up."

Lara nodded, feeling sordid. She was not happy that she had had to rely on Julian to keep her aboard, even if he was now acting on his own initiative. Bloody mess this was.

"We need to talk," Julian added. Lara couldn't have agreed more.


	9. Chapter 6 The accomplice

**Chapter VIThe accomplice**

The sun set, and the marina came to life. A mixture of traditional music and modern pop floated down to the seaside from nearby restaurants and bars. Some bathers still enjoyed the gentle evening surf, but mostly the beach was empty but for some couples and tourist groups walking down, some with drinks in their hands.

Lara and the rest of the team had finished the day's chores. After the charade at the diving school Lara had separated herself from Brian and Julian's company and headed downtown to find a pair of sneakers. She'd been mostly walking around the boat barefoot, but she'd grown weary of the blistering sores brought on by sticks pricking her toes. Julian had disappeared off somewhere to catch up with some old acquaintances, and Brian hadn't not disclosed where he had been planning on spending the day.

At six they'd met in front of the boat. Connie had not been feeling well and had decided to stay on the boat and rest, but the others had decided to head for dinner to a seaside restaurant. They'd chosen one slightly off the main boulevard which seemed to have a bigger concentration of local customers than the most touristy bars on the main beach.

Lara was wearing a pair of black capris and a form-fitting brown top with a pair of white sandals. Julian looked his disheveled self even though he wore a pair of clean shorts and a khaki T-shirt. Brian and Aricia looked as executive as ever, and Noah and Ben donned their trademark T-shirts and pants. Lara wondered if Noah would look presentable even in a tuxedo. Probably not.

Ben was in his trademark sour mood, arguing half-heartedly with Brian over some crackpot theory about the Bermuda Triangle. Aricia was being showered with attention by a couple of local guys, and to avoid suffering a similar fate Lara had retreated to sit at the counter with Julian.

They sat without talking, Lara sloshing her Glenfiddich around her wide glass, Julian intently staring at his third Tequila shot as though it was going to jump up and nip him in the face. They both knew they wouldn't be able to talk without the risk of someone joining in on the counter. Then Julian rose, looking like he'd realized something. "Come on," she said to Lara, grabbed her drink and plonked it on the counter.

"Hey, I wasn't finished yet."

"I know," Julian replied, "But it has to look like I finally dared to ask you and didn't want to turn back."

"Ask me what?" Lara was confused but stood up anyway.

"To dance." Without giving Lara the chance to reply, he headed to the dancefloor, pulling Lara along with him. She followed, but pulled her hand out of his.

They were now at the center of the floor, filled with couples and even individual dancers. A fast-paced salsa was ending, and the band began a rather poor rendition of Bon Jovi's 'You Give Love A Bad Name'.

Lara took his hand, placed her left one on his shoulder, and Julian lead them off. When they'd fallen into a steady pace, she glanced at him "I guess this was a good idea. Unless you just wanted an excuse to…"

Julian would have none of it. "They won't hear us over the music." He shot a quick glance at Brian, twenty meters away, laughing at something Ben had cracked, completely oblivious to what they were doing.

Lara wondered why she constantly felt the compulsion to try and ensure Julian had no ulterior motives. He'd shown no signs of such and Lara probably ought to lay the matter at rest already. It was just that with the few men she'd worked with, they'd usually at some point revealed that the ulterior motives were indeed there.

"Brian bought a gun today." Julian remarked casually.

"What?" Lara almost lost a step. "Why?"

"He knows your reputation. If he didn't before, Aricia made it pretty clear to him last night after you'd left the kitchen that you were willing to do anything, do in anyone, if they stood in your way."

Poor old Falshingham. He was brilliant but sometimes he could be rather naïve.

"I didn't think of Brian as capable of going that far."

"It's probably just for reassurance. If you pull your Colt, he'll pull out his wild card."

Julian had quite accurately identified Lara's pistol. So he knew something about guns as well. Lara gazed into his eyes. "For the third time, who are you?"

"Before I was a diplomat, I worked for MI-6. I retired from active service after I lost three team members in Afghanistan. I've seen the power games for this sort of relics, and I'm not the least bit surprised that Brian would go this far. He probably has a hefty commission waiting for him that not even Arie knows about."

"That explains a lot."

"So, what do you reckon we should do?"

"Correction, what _I_ should do," Lara added. "I'm not dragging you into this. It's between me and Brian, it seems."

"I'm coming with you. You need a backup. You have been thinking about leaving the group when we get back to the river and diving the last cenotes alone, haven't you?"

It wasn't hard to believe this man had worked for the British equivalent of the CIA.

"Just the fourth. It's our last bet. The entrance is like a barrel, no one could climb out of it. It's the farthest away from the ruins and no carvings have been found at the site, unlike the abundant decorations at the third cenote. If I were a priest hiding a dangerous trinket I wouldn't drop in it a hole known to the priests and in addition, a group of artisans. Connie and Aricia seem to think the Mayans would've wanted to mark the place, but I disagree."

Julian steered them even further away from Brian's table. "Still, there is the chance that the third could be the right one. You can't be sure."

"You're right, I can't. That's why I'm leaving tonight, as soon as we get back to the river. It's true that I could use a diving partner, that last cenote doesn't seem very stable."

Julian thought about this for a moment. "I could set anchor at the estuary area, that way it would take them longer to reach us after they notice we've gone."

"What about your boat?"

"They won't sink it, and it's you that they're going to be after. I'll get it back."

Lara shot him an indignant look. "Thanks."

The boat slowly made its way past the mangroves at the estuary. It had only been an hour's trip from Punta Allen back to the river, but most of the team had tired after the somewhat heavy consumption of liquor at the restaurant, and retired to their cabins. Lara and Julian lingered on the bridge, Julian steering and Lara looking at the night sky, which was getting more spectacular the further they got from the so-called civilization of the seashore villages.

As agreed, Julian set anchor some three miles from their previous site. They fixed the ropes to some nearby trees and quietly lowered a plank which would enable them to carry the heavy diving tanks ashore. Lara wondered if they could really achieve it all without anyone noticing. They'd packed ready in turns; first Julian, as it was easier for Lara to steer the boat when they were still at sea and Lara after him. After half-past eleven, the boat was silent and dark but for Lara and Julian, sitting on the deck. Avoiding even whispering, they carried both their diving gear and two extra tanks' worth of air to the riverbank, then carefully threw their heavy backpacks in. Lara walked the plank first, followed by Julian, who then tossed the heavy plank as far as he could muster.

They shared a look, and snuck away into the dark jungle as much as one could sneak dragging two heavy diving tanks and a backpack along.

Only when the hull lights of the boat were no longer visible and nothing seemed to stir in that direction did Julian dare to speak. "Lara?"

"Mm-hmm?" she had lit her flashlight to read a map she'd snatched from Brian and Aricia's cabin when they had gone for a swim the previous day. Julian had been spot on with guessing her plan; the moment Connie had told her that Brian was ready to ditch her she knew she'd had to solo this.

But as it happened, she didn't have to go solo after all. But could she trust Julian not to do exactly what Brian would have attempted, selling off what they would find? Lara could not be sure, but at least he wasn't armed. Still, something – a gut feeling – was telling her she probably had nothing to worry about concerning him. He'd made good money in his previous employment schemes and left it all behind, which made it unlikely for Julian to be in this for the thick wad of cash potentially associated.

"After seeing Brian and Ben's evidence, what's your take on the theory?"

"You're asking as to whether I'm now a firm believer that the Mayans, for instance, could never have achieved such feats by themselves without the help of aliens?"

Julian nodded, ducking after a low-hanging branch snapped back into place after Lara had pushed it aside. "I was just curious. I mean, you wouldn't be here if there wasn't a realistic risk that Ben's conspiracy theory could be true."

"It is a possibility, yes. The Mayans lived their Golden Period just two hundred years after their first city-states were born. By anyone's standards that is quite flabbergasting. But as to their empire's sudden collapse, I'm not so sure about alien influence."

"Care to elaborate?" Julian hoisted his spare tank more properly onto his back and Lara had to pause in her fast stride to wait for him.

"It is true that the city-states collapsed very suddenly and no remains of any natural disasters or suchlike have ever been found." She paused to listen, for a moment she'd thought she'd heard something but it had most likely just been a nightbird, "But I don't share Ben's conviction that this happened because their celestial advisors took a hike. The Mayans held their kings in very important positions; without them as mediators between the gods and the humans the world was thrown into chaos."

"Even more than the Egyptians?" Julian asked.

"Yes, even more so. The Mayans saw a working link to the supernatural as essential to their daily life, and if such a link was severed, a city state could be thrown into chaos – signs of such events have been found at Tikal, for instance, where there was nearly a hundred years of famine and disorder after a ruler had been kidnapped and killed by a rival city state."

"But weren't the Mayans a unified civilization and the city states connected?" Julian was puzzled. He'd had the image that like Aztecs, Mayan society was quite peaceful and trade and other links between the city states abundant.

"Not at all. They were not a federation but a group of rival societies. They were culturally influenced by one another, yes, but not as strongly as, say, the Olmecs. Anyway, the same kind of thinking, with the rulers acting as links to the gods shows in the sacrificial practices," Lara commented, vaulting onto a low boulder and back down on the other side. Julian opted for walking around the thing and wondered where Lara could possibly draw all this physical energy from. Especially while carrying two diving tanks in the middle of the night.

"Go on."

"Between Mayans and their gods existed a co-dependency. People were created in order that they would be able to name the gods and worship them. The gods took care of the people if the people took care of them – kind of a 'you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours' –kind of deal. If a ruler or a king suffered in the hands of a rival state, the same thing happened simultaneously to their gods. And if humans showed enough submission as to sacrifice themselves to the gods, perhaps the gods would grant them an equally appreciative gift."

"Sounds gory but logical."

Lara paused, her chest heaving after the terrain had begun to get steeper. According to her map they were about two kilometers from the site of the furthest cenote.

"You want to take a break?" Julian asked, already digging out his water bottle.

Lara did not stop. "Not now. We have to start the dive as soon as possible. Every minute we can buy is a minute free from Brian and his ilk."


	10. Chapter 6 part 2

The jungle breathed. Shades of blue, black and green shifted like dancing shadows. A faint breeze that seemed to generate on the spot was moving the low-hanging leafy branches of jacaranda trees like invisible hands.

The last cenote opened like a gate to hell, completely black in the dim moonlight, the reflections of clouds shrouding it in a shifting dance. It was terrible and beautiful at the same time, inviting one to dive deep and never to surface.

That gaping maw, that diabolic gateway was what awaited Lara Croft and Julian Morrow.

They stripped off their shirts and shorts – both wore wetsuits underneath. Suddenly Lara turned to Julian. "It just occurred to me that with all your interrogations I never got the chance to ask you what your final verdict was. Ancient astronauts or simply ancient humans drinking too much maize ale and inventing fantastic stories?"

"I can't help thinking that the world would be a lot more boring a place if I didn't have the slightest belief that it might be true. Wasn't it Werner von Braun who said that it would be most presumptuous of us humans to think that we could be the only living thing in the immensity of the universe?"

Lara pulled on her flippers. They'd hidden their gear some thirty meters away from the entranceway and Lara was unsure as to whether it was wise to use a safety rope – it would instantly alert anyone to their diving at the location, and it wouldn't do much good anyway – she was certain Brian would be so furious to find out that he'd cut it. Maybe they could use Julian's darker rope and tie it somewhere underwater?

He'd clearly gotten had the same idea, and was ready to jump into the water, the dark blue safety line neatly folded in his left hand.

Lara raised her hand and he halted. "Wait. How are we going to get out of there?"

The term 'sacrificial well' did justice to this cenote. The water surface was some six meters below where they were standing, and the walls were smooth and no footholds were visible – at least for climbers with diving tanks and flippers. Then Lara had an idea. She went to their packs, dug out one of Julian's lighter climbing ropes and tied in to a tree. She let it run along the ground and hid it underneath a thick tree root. Then she let the rest of it drop into the water, and shoved the visible part of it into a crevasse in the wall. In the dark it gave the impression of just a long tree root stretching to the water.

"Brilliant," Julian commented. He grabbed the rope to descend. Lara, however, turned her back to the brackish water, and let herself drop some six meters into the water. She sank deep, wet leaves and something else that was damp and unpleasant tugging and touching her in the wet well. She surfaced, spluttering perhaps more out of excitement than anything else. Julian handed her the blue line, and she tied it to another tree root protruding from the soil underwater.

They checked their regulators, made sure everything was in order, and then let the black maw swallow them.

The cavern was almost vertical. It felt unpleasant to dive straight down inside the narrow passageway, knowing that turning back was perhaps not possible at all in the confined spaces.

This was a true cenote, one that had been used for sacrifice. Some thick-leaved water plants had caught bones brought back to the surface probably by the same strange updrafts which Lara and Julian felt tugging at them as they dove further. The current was not stable but kept changing in strength and feel. They were pushing them back up the well, and they had to strain their calf muscles to ensure a steady pace forward. Julian used the rough walls to push himself further, and Lara opted for diving with her hands outstretched and kicking fiercely. Diving in the lead, she was worried that the shaft would turn too narrow for them to pass through. If that happened they would have to backtrack feet-first to the surface, which would not be pleasant in the least.

Julian seemed to share her concern. His eyes were restless and Lara was aware that where she could still pass through would inevitably at some point turn impossibly narrow for him.

Then the passage veered slightly to the left, and branched into two tunnels. The first headed straight left, turning horizontal but the other was a continuum of the shaft through which they had entered and still dropped quite deeply towards what seemed to be the centre of the Earth.

Lara glanced at her watch. They'd been underwater for half an hour. In their tanks they had air for approximately two hours if they remained calm and did not hyperventilate. She decided that if they didn't find anything in fifteen minutes they'd have to return to the surface.

Then something flashed past her. Julian dodged it by pressing himself onto the wall, but Lara had been straight on its route. In the dark she could not make out any features and for some reason she couldn't bring herself to raise her light so that she could see whatever it was. They could feel the waves it made, and it lunged towards them as though in attack. Lara braced herself for an attack, but it never came. Whatever it was, it dissipated upon contact and all Lara could feel was a deep cold that felt as though she'd been plunged into ice water. Shivering, she turned to Julian, eyes wide. He shrugged, looking equally shaken.

Lara knew she couldn't stop to think what they'd just encountered. Precious seconds of oxygen were already being wasted and there were more pressing matters at hand. They pushed forwards.

The tunnel widened and almost suddenly a cavern opened before them. This time there was no dry area, no stalactites and no light, just blackness. Lara signaled for Julian to enter it with her.

Together they left the passageway and entered the larger cavern, shaped like a hollow discus. The light of Julian's lamp died – he'd banged it against the shaft wall when the creature had swooshed past them and water had probably trickled into the battery. He let it fall to the floor, and began feeling the bottom with his hands. Lara used her light but it wasn't of much use – their swimming around was raising a thousand year's worth of bone dust, old leaves, soil and fine sand from the bottom, making it impossible to make out any shapes on the bottom.

Bones there were. In piles. Ancient skeletons in pieces. Every time she felt another smooth, round shape on the bottom Lara's heart leapt, thinking she'd found something, but every time it was just a skull. Julian seemed to be having the same problem. Most of the skulls were large, but she'd also come up with some very small, as of children's. Still, Lara paid them no mind. Then Julian grabbed her arm and took the light from her.

He held up one of the smaller skulls and pushed it into the cone of Lara' diving light. True, it was small and gave the impression of a child, but a spine stump was still attached. It didn't take a medical degree to tell that something was amiss. The spine did not consist of individual vertebrae, but hollow, round pieces of very fine bone-looking substance, which bent a lot more freely than a normal set of neck vertebrae, even though this was probably centuries old.

The skull was alarming as well. It had abnormally large, almond-shaped and oblique eye sockets, and the occiput was very prominent, giving it an elongated shape. Lara and Julian exchanged a glance, each unsure what to think. Then Julian simply let the peculiar skull float to the bottom and continued groping around.

They happened upon it almost simultaneously. It was no skull, but something made of smooth metal. Lara turned her lamp down towards it. It was lying under a shifting pile of bones. It was similar in design to many medieval jousting helmets, but had invisible seams and a lot more streamlined shape. It looked like new, even though it was likely it had been lying around for as long as the bones had. And the strangest thing was that it was warm, considerably warmer than the bones, the water or the surrounding walls.

They floated silently in the darkness, Lara's light pointed at the helmet's strange features. It was with mixed emotions that they turned away from the main chamber and returned to the shaft. When they were safely inside the narrow passageway Lara handed the helmet to Julian and signaled for him to swim away from the chamber. Julian did not do so, puzzled by Lara's behavior. She seemed adamant, and finally he complied.

Julian watched as Lara dug out what seemed some sort of a detonation device, armed it, and used her fin to kick it into the chamber. Then she began furiously swimming forward, frantically signaling for Julian to follow suit. Soon a formidable blast made their ears pop even though underwater, and the impact sent powerful ripples towards them, shaking the whole narrow shaft.

Suddenly, all hell broke loose. Something that felt like air but definitely could not be rushed out of the larger chamber along with the blast – black shadows, almost shining, swam past at what seemed like the speed of light, pushing Lara forward and suddenly her lamp went dark. The hallway kept shaking, and parts of the upper shaft broke loose, dropping towards the bottom at an alarming speed. Julian managed to press himself into the wall to avoid collision, but after losing her light Lara was suddenly so blinded by the darkness she had no chance of avoiding them. One larger piece nearly threw her back towards the chamber filled with bones, but in the end it stopped, lodging Lara's foot between it and the chamber wall.

The shaking stopped, and the structure seemed stable enough again.

Julian could not see Lara, nor could he hear her in the water. He used the wall to maneuver himself back towards the bottom, and when his leg hit the lodged boulder he began using his free hand to feel around for Lara. Their arms met, and she grabbed his hand perhaps a bit harder than was necessary. Panic was setting in, neither Lara nor Julian knew how much oxygen was left or if other rocks might have blocked their way out. And neither of them had any desire to investigate the strange, moving shadows that had made their second appearance.

Lara grabbed Julian even tighter, trying to use the leverage of his arm and the walls to pull herself free. The boulder moved slightly when she tried to pull her leg free – in the water it was less heavy. Julian braced himself onto the wall above Lara, leaned the helmet onto the wall to free his hands, and in a combined effort they tore Lara's leg free from the boulder, which then slowly bounced down to the bottom.

They stopped to breathe, then began diving higher up the shaft. Soon Lara began lagging behind, the adrenaline rush giving way to a severe, dull pain in her leg where the boulder had hit her. She tasted metal in her mouth and felt waves of nausea begin to form and the leg's ache began worsening. Sensing her hesitation, Julian grabbed Lara's arm, and began pulling her ahead towards the surface.

After what seemed like hours but what actually was just a few tortuous minutes, they surfaced. Lara literally spat away her regulator and raised her leg above the surface to inspect it in the moonlight. The boulder had bit off a large portion of flesh from the middle part of the front of her left leg, and she was almost certain she could make out a peek of bone on the bottom of the wound. Blood was oozing at a steady pace. It was painful, but she was certain no bones were broken – the boulder had pinned, but not crushed her into the wall and she had not felt the telltale cracking sensation of bone giving out. She felt weak and sick and knew she had to see to this before the blood loss would prevent them from leaving.

Julian tore off his own mask and swam to the side of the cenote to find the rope Lara had hidden.

It wasn't there.

Julian scratched at the crevice frantically, but no rope could be found. Perhaps it was the wrong one? He couldn't see any others.

Suddenly the whole world exploded in light. For a moment he could not see anything but the reflection of his own retinas, but then the landscape returned and he realized he was staring into the light of someone's flashlight.

It was Brian, joined soon by Aricia and Ben. Connie and Noah stood behind them. Noah looked rather scared in Julian's opinion, but Connie seemed all but.

Brian's eyes flashed in anger, but it obviously wasn't Julian he was planning on inflicting some damage to. With his left hand he raised a pistol.

Julian turned back towards the middle of the cenote. "Lara, dive!"

She complied without thinking, sensing a spray of bullets whip past her. She didn't have her tank which she'd discarded shortly after her regulator and mask, and knew that even though she could hold her breath for a considerable time, the updrafts would keep her from being able to dive any deeper since she had also discarded her weight belt. Instead, she headed to the shady side of the cenote, opposite Brian and the others, and dug her claws and bare feet into the wall. She had discarded her flippers right after surfacing. The ground was surprisingly soft, and it was with desperate leaps and shaky holds that she managed to pull herself onto the ground some six meters above. It was only then than she dared to worry about Julian and not just herself. If she'd seen correctly he'd diven downward as well.

Julian surfaced some five meters from where she was standing and threw her the helmet. Lara grabbed it, and dashed off into the thick bushes just before Brian screamed and bullets began to zip past her again.

She just ran. She did not feel the sharp rocks beneath her naked feet, nor did she notice the occasional slap of branches against her face. She hugged the helmet to her chest, her heart bleeding for not being able to even look back to see if Julian was running behind her. This was what she had come for, not him. She knew he was collateral damage, but Lara wasn't one to leave a comrade behind. He'd been there for her, now it was time for her to reciprocate.

Cursing loudly at the softness of her character, Lara turned on her heels and dashed back towards the cenote.

She took a sharp turn, not wanting to return the same way she'd come, since it was likely Brian and his ilk were following close by.

When she got back to the cenote, the first person she came face to face with was Connie. Or Connie's pistol, to be precise. Lara froze at her feet, glancing quickly into the black cenote water. Julian was there, looking irritated but alright, swimming in the middle of it. It was obvious Connie had stayed behind to see that he couldn't get to Lara.

"I wouldn't have thought you'd come back now that you've got your prize, Lara."

"Well, unlike some, I do not have the habit of kicking out good people from the team." Lara spat back, her mind going through the possible ways of getting to her backpack to recover her pistol.

Connie was taken aback. "Is that what this is about? Are you saying that the bullshit Brian got from his dad that you were here just for a holiday was true? Give me a break. You know as well as I do that where there's a major discovery, there's always Lara Croft."

"You've been listening to Noah's ramblings too much."

Deciding there would be no reasoning with a fanatic like Connie, Lara opted for one of her usual stunts; she used all the strength she could muster to kick as much dirt as she could into Connie's face, and dashed towards her backpack. She was there in an instant, whipped out her gun, and when Connie got to their pile of gear in the dark, she was already waiting for her. Lara leapt behind her, and pressed the gun into her back. "Now, either you give that to me, or you are seriously going to regret it later."

Connie did not even flinch. Instead of giving the pistol to Lara she pointed it towards Julian, who had now climbed out of the water, making use of Lara's route in the shade, and hurried after them.

Knowing she had no chance, Lara grimaced and squeezed the trigger.

Connie fell, her hands clutching at Lara, but she sidestepped, letting her slump into the undergrowth.

Lara shivered. She'd known. Somehow she'd known all along that before this was over, someone would have to die by her hand.


	11. Chapter 7 Leap of Faith & Epilogue

**Chapter VIILeap of Faith**

They ran. Even though there was no evidence of pursuers, they ran. Lara set the pace, negotiating the almost nonexistent jungle paths with an athletic grace despite the pain in her leg which she seemed to be successfully ignoring. Julian trailed behind, keeping up as best as he could, panting but not slowing down.

The first, red hints of sunrise were showing somewhere in the horizon beyond the jungle.

Lara quickened her pace. Her mind was a whirl of images, from the large-socketed skulls to Connie, to Falshingham, to the sight of her own blood running trickling down onto the ground and as Julian used his long-since last revised training to dress her gaping wound. She saw the moving shadows of the cenote shaft, the feel of Julian's hand grabbing her own, the mixture of pain and exhilaration as her leg finally pulled free from under the rock. It was the same process that played in her mind whenever too much had happened in too little time.

They reached the pyramids of Muyil at sunrise. The open grassland of the ruins alarmed Lara slightly; if Brian was here then they were in his plain sight. Still, the fields were empty and the only sounds they could hear was of the wind in the ruins.

For the first time in hours, Lara stopped and let herself fall sitting into the soft grass. Clouds moved in the bluest sky she remembered seeing, and the pyramid field was silent. For the first time since the cenote she dared to breathe, really breathe.

Julian lay down onto the grass, still panting. He turned to face the helmet that Lara had placed onto the grass between them.

It was grayish white in colour and very smooth. Julian couldn't recognizethe metal, but after all they'd seen it seemed almost logical to him that no human would. The shape was unlike any that he'd seen, but Lara's comparison to medieval designs wasn't far off. It looked exactly alike one of Ben's images from Tiahuanaco where one of the so-called ancient astronauts was depicted sitting inside a round structure, donning a helmet exactly like this one.

He wouldn't try it on. Somehow he knew Lara wouldn't either. In the end, Lara was probably right that no one should. The artifact did not look very special, but the almost pulsing warmness of it was a good clue that something actually might happen if someone chose to use it instead of just keeping it as a lawn ornament.

Lara dug out a water bottle from her backpack. Julian stood up. They were next to one of the higher pyramids, the other side of which almost vertically dropped down a ravine. The steps up to the top were carved with lively reliefs. He signaled for Lara to join him. Ever the thorough person, she took the helmet with her.

Lara began walking up the stairs, reading the carvings aloud to the best of her abilities. Her Mayan, it seemed, was a bit rusty.

"It tells of a sun god, sent from heaven to crown a king. He did, and the land prospered. Then the god decided that people should be given a chance to decide for themselves, to make mistakes and learn from them instead of being given the right answers by a higher power."

The engraving continued higher above. Julian and Lara looked at one another, shrugged and began climbing the pyramid.

"There was chaos. The god was asked to stay, with offerings of great military victory and sacrifice, even of the sons the sun god himself had created with human women—"

"Genetic interference?" Julian asked. He shuddered at the thought of the small, odd-shaped skulls.

Lara just shook her head. She did not want to delve deeper into the subject. She read on, climbing the steps as she did. "The god was adamant. He was to leave, but as a token of gratitude he left something behind—the text is broken and I can't make out what it is—" both their gazes fell onto the helmet. This read just like any basic myth, but was starting to make serious sense.

Lara continued on as they ascended towards the skies, the Yucatan jungle spreading like a green ocean below their feet. "The king, furious by this abandonment, decided to harness the power of the god by wearing the god's crown. But this drove him mad, the skies opened, and a great fire destroyed the city. The king died and so did his people, in the 'great storm' that followed – that could've meant a war of some sorts – and, disappointed at the god, the priests destroyed all that remained of his visit."

"Or so they thought," someone added from behind them.

Lara and Julian turned on their feet; Julian so fast he nearly lost his balance on the low but narrow pyramid steps. Lara whipped out her pistol.

Brian. And Aricia, both sporting what looked like heavy-caliber pistols.

"So, it's archaeology first, murder then?" asked Lara, venom in her tone.

"I should probably ask you the same question, since Connie didn't meet us at the ruins," Aricia replied, pointing her gun at Julian. "And Brian's father so insisted you were a trustworthy guy. I say none such exists, not when there's money involved."

"Look," Lara began, trying to force a more amicable tone out of herself but with little success, "Has either of you ever stopped to wonder what this thing actually is, and what it's still capable of doing?"

Aricia snorted. "It's supposed to have some weird powers. But the main thing is, it looks nice and in addition could prove quite a nut to crack for a lot of UFO skeptics. Plus it's a magnificent piece of history, a possible explanation for a lot of weird stuff the Mayans, the Sumerians, the ancient Egyptians and dozens of other cultures did."

Lara shook her head, her pistol trained steadily at Brian. She knew they were two against one weapon-wise, and there was not much she could do if Aricia decided to take her anger out on Julian.

"How did you find us?" Julian inquired.

"The only road from here to Muyil runs next to the ruins," Brian retorted. "I assumed you wouldn't be stupid enough to return to the boat or try to hike to Uxmal."

Lara slowly inhaled. She knew what their only option was, and she didn't like it one bit.

Suddenly she no longer had time to think of a plan. She felt a sharp pain in her hand, the pistol clattering down the pyramid and she realized that out of the blue, Brian had shot her in the hand. "Julian, RUN!" she yelled, turned and dashed up the pyramid. Julian followed suit.

Lara guessed Brian probably wasn't good enough a marksman to hit them while they were running, and Aricia looked so uncomfortable with her pistol Lara was almost sure she was not going to use it. But Brian had already used his once, and after losing her own weapon Lara was not willing to risk her luck with him again.

The chase continued until Lara and Julian reached the top of the pyramid. On the other side was the ravine and behind them, Brian. Lara stared at the tops of the jacaranda trees some ten meters below, and knew she had no choice.

She looked at Julian and smiled. He smiled back and took her hand. Suddenly it was all so clear. Whether they would survive was another thing.

Taking one last look behind them, Lara and Julian dashed off the top of the pyramid, hand in hand, Lara squeezing the ancient astronaut helmet against her chest.

**Epilogue:Origin**

"You brought it _here_?" Falshingham was visibly amazed.

Lara opened the canvas bag she was carrying over her shoulder, and lay the helmet down onto Falshingham's large, oakwood desk. It glimmered faintly, with no trace of wear or tear.

Unlike Lara. The fall through the canopy had given her several fractured ribs, had reopened the wound in her leg, caused massive bruising in her back and dislodged a neck vertebra. She'd been sporting a support collar for weeks, and had finally gotten rid of it a few days prior to being released from the hospital. As per instructions Winston had arranged the helmet's delivery to England labeled as diving gear, and had kept it safe at the manor. After all, it was unlikely Brian would start playing thief in Britain, and even less likely that he believed Lara and Julian to be alive after their fall from the pyramid. No one knew about the helmet. No one would care.

Which meant that Lara had succeeded. Without solid evidence – the helmet itself – whatever Brian, Aricia, Ben and Noah decided to claim to the world, they would just sound like typical von Daeniken disciples, dedicated to their cause but with nothing solid to pass as proof.

Falshingham touched it gently. It was as warm as ever. "You believe now? After the skulls, after everything."

Lara stretched, sitting down onto the armrest of a velvet-covered armchair. "I don't think anyone will care if I believe or not. Like I told Julian I've seen too much to feel I could neatly label everything as true, untrue, natural or supernatural. Or alien."

"How is Julian? He did not return to Britain with you, I reckon?"

Lara shook her head. "No. He decided to return to Bolivia. Even after Connie's death he didn't think it would cause much of an upheaval if he returned. He's fine – he got a skull fracture, a crushed tibia but he'll be as good as new."

"Might there be another mission in store for the two of you?" Falshingham hinted and his tone clearly hinted that he believed that Lara and Julian's relationship might not have been of the neutral kind.

Lara smirked. "Oh come off it, you old fool. Most likely not. But who knows, I do have a tendency of getting acquainted with people who keep popping up in the most unlikely of circumstances."

Falshingham returned his gaze to the helmet. "Still, I'm surprised that you would bring this to me."

Lara scoffed. "Not for keeping, obviously. We first thought we might drop it into Arenal or something—" Lara commented, referring to one of Mexico's largest volcanoes, "but since that would've been quite difficult even though Julian and I indeed were in adjoining rooms at the hospital—" Falshingham laughed, "story of my life, I've now seen most of the notable ruins in the world and the most notable hospitals located near them."

"So you thought it best to worry about destroying it later."

Lara shrugged. "I figured you would probably have some bright ideas, perhaps even some more… esoteric means of destroying it."

Falshingham looked content. "True, very true. But still, given the basic human nature, I thought we could use some stress relief through a more traditional means of destruction."

Lara raised her eyebrows.

"Maria?" Falshingham called out to his maid, who obediently and without the slightest hint of bewilderment at what they were up to, carried in a pair of medieval-looking sledgehammers, nearly toppling over for the weight of them.

Lara giggled. "You can't be serious."

"Dead serious. First we'll hit this thing until kingdom come, then we'll cast the rest in concrete and make sure it finds itself to the bottom of Loch Ness or some other godforsaken puddle."

"Sounds creative enough to me," Lara concluded and decided she would gladly participate. Still, the tiniest of voices in her head kept saying that Julian should've been given the chance to join in as well.

"Good. Now stop yammering and start hammering," Falshingham ordered.

Lara tucked a few stray strands of hair behind her ear, lifted the hammer and felt a huge relief as the helmet soon began to lose its shape, turning into a piece of scrap metal no one would ever recognize. Some stones were, indeed, best left unturned.

The End

_This story is dedicated to J, with love._

The author wishes to thank the following remarkable individuals:

Tim Radley, without whom none of my TR stories could ever have amounted to anything but a waste of paper.

Jeppe Cleve, a dear friend and a brilliant author whose works will one day take the whole net by surprise.

Advis, for her unwavering belief that TR is the greatest thing since sliced bread (perhaps even greater). Even when I falter you stay true to what's important.

Sarah Crisman, Rhys D, Ostercy, Dwaine Henderson, Rob Simmons, SilverRope, Shehi & many others who have both been good friends and invaluable comrades in bringing the TR fanfic legacy back to its feet through many projects including the Croft Codex.

A very special thanks goes to Dr Amazing for giving me permission to borrow Eric Falshingham for this story.

Please note that even though the names and theories of actual scientists and ancient astronaut believers were used in this story, some of them were twisted and changed to fit the storyline, as were some facts on Mayan culture. The engravings explained in this story do not exist.

Further reading about ancient astronauts:

reading about diving in cenotes and their use as Mayan sacrifical wells:

of 


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